Backyard Hockey Rink

Every year, in my neighbor's yard we put up a 30' x 60' hockey rink for the kids to skate on. The construction is always the same, 2 x 12s lap nailed together and a huge plastic liner that we buy at a local builders supply. Fill it with a hose and wait for Mother Nature to do her work...she really defines whether it is a good or bad year. We're probably the only people in Cleveland hoping for long, very cold sustained periods of weather. The biggest key to success is finding as level an area of ground as possible, 2" to 4" of water freezes pretty quickly. For a Zamboni, we have a home made model I made out of an old wagon which works pretty well, but a quick skim with snow shovels and laying a running hose on it and wiggling it back and forth like a snake lays a uniform 1/4" of water down and works well too. It's lots of fun and quite easy to do, plus you can reuse the lumber year after year.