One of the our followers on Instagram, Kyle and his Dad, Kevin, have been building a their backyard rink for 16+ years and I have to say, it is pretty darn sweet. One of the features that caught my attention was the addition of a shade to help with the sun on the north side of their rink. I was talking with Kevin about his setup and this is what he shared.
They started with a hole about 10″ diameter * 3′ deep on one side of the rink and put a receiver pipe in there and filled with concrete. After assembling the boards, we put in a 12′ pipe into the receiver pipe with four support cables from the top to points east, west, north, south. The west cable runs parallel to the ground and crosses the rink at the right place so the shade’s shadow falls on the ice at the north end where the sun does the most damage. The west cable attaches to the deck. The first attempt which had the bottom tied down self-destructed in a couple of hours. Now they leave the bottom flapping in the breeze.
They sourced their shade from MyTarp.com.
