The 1970s and ‘80s represented the heyday of snowmaking installations in the Northeast. But snowmaking pipe does not last forever. And as these “I won’t be here when this thing fails” installations start to exceed their design lives, the industry is facing serious maintenance issues. Replacing snowmaking pipe is now a common occurrence, and can be an expensive endeavor. A resort’s ability to install pipe in-house can really save money.

For Peak Resorts, snowmaking is one of the most important parts of winter operations. Having an effective, efficient, and reliable system is critical to maximizing snowmaking production. Here’s how we make sure we can deliver the water we need, when we need it.


1. Make a Plan
This may seem obvious, but the routing of snowmaking pipe, as well as its size, are both critical to the overall success of the system. For many of us, air used to be the restricting factor. Now, with low-energy air/water guns, as well as fan guns, we run out of water capacity first, not air, at all 13 of our resorts. To accommodate this, an increase in pipe diameter is sometimes in order, which may require an upgrade to pumps. Adding pumps can be a major overhaul, but most snowmaking systems were designed with the pipe size in mind, so if a resort is looking for significantly more water, an upgrade may be needed.

When planning your pipe layout, it’s important to know what types of snowmaking technology your system is feeding, or will feed in the future. Ask yourself: What type of flows do you expect the trail to currently use? Does the resort expect to upgrade the technology in the near future? Understanding both current and future demands for both water and air is critical in designing a system that will last for 20 to 30 years. When we are burying pipe, we will use thicker walled pipe, and we prefer that it is FBE coated—an epoxy that is added to the outside of the pipe. The epoxy helps to protect the pipe from corrosion.


2. Measure Your Plan Accurately
Start by drawing your plan on a free mapping program, such as Google Earth. This will give you a baseline to measure against when you head to the hill. Use a measuring wheel on the trails and areas where you plan to install the pipe. Note specific areas where turns or drastic changes in elevation will require extra welding. This will help to estimate the number of fittings you’ll require; these sections will also increase the length of pipe you need.

Accurate measurement makes it possible to ensure that you order the proper amount of pipe. With long lead times and expensive shipping costs, it is important to order just once. Peak Resorts typically buys 5 to 10 percent more pipe than the measurements indicate, to be sure we do not come up short. Minor changes to the installation plan are always required, as it’s difficult to measure every twist and fold in uneven or rough terrain, and unforeseen circumstances always arise.


3. In-Ground or Above Ground?
The terrain your snowmaking pipe traverses typically dictates whether it will go above or below ground. There are positives and negatives to both applications. In the Midwest, where digging is easy, systems are mostly installed underground, below the frost line. This practically eliminates the risk of freezing the pipe, and many times allows for the system to stay full of water even when we are not making snow, which allows for a much quicker start up. Buried systems also save money by conserving water that above-ground lines need to maintain flow.

On the other hand, buried pipe is a lot harder to fix, as it requires exposing a piece of equipment. We have also seen that buried pipe has a shorter life span, often two to five years shorter, mostly due to electrolysis in the soil that erodes the pipe over time. To overcome this, sacrificial wall thickness can be used when ordering the pipe. When we bury pipe, we normally use .250 (quarter-inch) wall or more. Wall thickness certainly prolongs the life span, but it also significantly increases cost, and makes the pipe much heavier and harder to work with.

Our systems in New England are mostly above ground due to the prevalence of rock, as well as the length of the trails. That length adds cost, yet in addition to lasting longer and being easier to fix, above-ground pipe is less expensive to install than buried pipe. A key downside to above-ground systems, however, is that in addition to being susceptible to freeze, they require minimum overflows that waste productive water.

A best practice that Peak Resorts uses on new snowmaking installations is to bury the main feed lines whenever possible. This insulates the water from super-cooling as it is delivered to the down-line on which you will be making snow. Obviously, this is not possible at all resorts, but it provides a layer of protection against freezing where it is feasible.


4. Less Hose, Fewer Headaches
As a general rule, we try to run the pipe as close to where the snow gun is or will be located—within 15 feet, if possible. This allows us to use 25-foot hoses. The shorter the hose, the easier it is for the snowmakers to handle, and to take on and off the hill. This makes setup, startup, and shutdown a lot easier. We also like to install our water and air hydrants slightly downhill from the snow gun, to help with drainage. This is also helpful if you plan to automate the snow guns on the trail in the future.


5. Stage Pipe in a Convenient Place
Pipe is heavy and cumbersome, so you want to move it as few times as possible. Find a place that is out of the way but also easily accessible to the trails where you will be installing it. A large flat area works best; we normally use a parking lot or another open space around the base area.


6. The Base Is the Place (for Welding)
Peak Resorts has some fantastic pipe welders, and every one of them is more productive on flat ground in the base area than on a steep section on the hill. We set up what we call a “stringing site” in the base area, where we weld the pipe in lengths or “strings” of 100 to 400 feet, which are then pulled up the trail into place. The goal is to make as few weld joints up on the hill as possible. If a trail is straight, it is possible to get away with longer strings and reduce on-hill weld joints or tie-ins. Depending on the scope of the project, these lengths can be purpose-built to fit into specific places on the trail.

At some resorts, it may be necessary to string pipe near the location where it will be pulled in. This will require an extra pipe transportation operation. In that case, think about how the pipe will be moved and troubleshoot in advance any issues you anticipate. This will save substantial time and money later.


7. Pulling into Place
Once the pipe is joined into lengths, we weld an end cap with an eyehole or other means to hook the pipe to whatever machine will pull it up the trail and move it into place. We have used a wide variety of equipment to pull pipe up the mountain: skidders, bulldozers, excavators, snowcats, even a farm tractor. Regardless of the machine, it’s important to connect pipe and machine with an industrial swivel. As pipe is towed, the long lengths are constantly twisting. The swivel allows the pipe to twist without building up stored energy and causing potential failure of your towing connection.

We are not overly concerned about dragging above-ground pipe and scratching it, as it will not suffer anywhere near as much damage as corrosion causes
buried pipe.

Buried pipe needs protection from corrosion. In rocky or blasted areas, we will often encase the pipe in sand—six inches below and above.

Wet areas are typically the most corrosive on pipe, and sometimes the use of anode bags can help fight electrolysis. Anode bags help offer protection from underground currents that deteriorate pipe. They last from five to 10 years, depending on the corrosiveness of the soil. The anodes need to be marked so they can be dug up and changed at the end of their life span, so if you use them, make sure you have a way to mark their location.

Pulling pipe stringers into place is a calculated risk that we take, the risk being danger of damaging the pipe. With major feed lines and pipe that is in hard-to-reach places, such as under public roads, we weld the pipe in place, take care to bed the pipe with sand, and repair/coat any scratches. Out on the mountain, however, it’s best to do a cost analysis to evaluate the incremental costs of protecting the pipe. Is it worth buying heavier-wall pipe? Is that less expensive than bedding everything with sand or welding each piece in place? What design life are you trying to achieve?


8. Test It
Finally, make sure that you test and clear out your new pipe before you bury it (if underground) or hook up your guns (all installations). Even though we try to keep debris out of the pipe while we are installing it, we still find that some rocks, dirt, or the occasional grinding wheel can end up inside the system. For this reason, you will want to keep the bleed—an adjustable valve—off the pipe when you flush it for the first time. We often run for several hours on our new pipe, either discharging back into our water source or at a bleed, where we discharge on the mountain itself. Frequently, we also introduce water into our air system pipe to flush it.