FLAG!
02-02-2006, 11:03 AM
Seeing the lack of safe ice this year and seeing bubblers needlessly work overtime making wider open water every minute makes me think it would be a good idea to share this with all dock caretakers.
We have a multi-familu owned camp in Wolfeboro. We have to split the bills for everything and we don't all have the same size wallet at verious times of the year, so needless to say we try hard to conserve energy to reduce our utilities costs. I guess anyone would do that anyway.
For many years we've used an agitator on a timer to keep the ice clear from our dock, but often it would be plugged in in November not knowing if anyone will get there again before the lake freezes. Obvioulsy this would many times result in the agitator running when it didn't need to.
About 25 years ago we used to use a thermostatically controlled bubbler but the thermostat was unreliable at best. Well, technology has improved since then and this year we revisted the thermostat idea. We bought a $40.00 thermostat on-line and have been using it this year. The dock is ice free, yet there is not an enormous open water hole around the dock. The stat is working great and in addition to allowing the ice to grow thicker at our nearby access point (a little beach near the dock), it's saving us a bundle on electricity costs.
this is one of those things we kept procrastinating about and I wish we did it long ago. If everyone used a thermostat we could all save some money and help the environment, all while making the ice that much thicker which we could all use during winters like this....
We have a multi-familu owned camp in Wolfeboro. We have to split the bills for everything and we don't all have the same size wallet at verious times of the year, so needless to say we try hard to conserve energy to reduce our utilities costs. I guess anyone would do that anyway.
For many years we've used an agitator on a timer to keep the ice clear from our dock, but often it would be plugged in in November not knowing if anyone will get there again before the lake freezes. Obvioulsy this would many times result in the agitator running when it didn't need to.
About 25 years ago we used to use a thermostatically controlled bubbler but the thermostat was unreliable at best. Well, technology has improved since then and this year we revisted the thermostat idea. We bought a $40.00 thermostat on-line and have been using it this year. The dock is ice free, yet there is not an enormous open water hole around the dock. The stat is working great and in addition to allowing the ice to grow thicker at our nearby access point (a little beach near the dock), it's saving us a bundle on electricity costs.
this is one of those things we kept procrastinating about and I wish we did it long ago. If everyone used a thermostat we could all save some money and help the environment, all while making the ice that much thicker which we could all use during winters like this....