I thought a write a little blurb amount my first snowmaking experience. In South Carolina, it is not often that we actually get any real snow. We are lucky if we even get a flurry or two each year. My children, the oldest is six, have never even seen snow, except on TV. It just doesn’t seem to snow as much now and it did back in the day.

As a child, there were many nights that I stayed up late staring out of the window at the streetlamp - waiting for that slight chance of snow that the weatherman promised, even if no accumulation was expected. Folks down here get really excited about the white stuff.

So, for my daughter’s sixth birthday, I decided to help things along with a little white surprise, as the weather was forecasted to be in the teens and twenties for a couple of nights straight. Here is my story.

The family business is mechanical contracting, which is basically plumbing, heating, electrical, etc. Even though I chose a different career path (I’m a software engineer), I worked with my father and brothers all through school, gaining a lot of practical knowledge along the way. The best part is, I still have access to all of their tools, equipment, and parts inventory. 

After a little research online, I began working on my list of materials. They had several pressure washers and several portable air compressors that I could use. With a full inventory of plumbing fittings, the only things lacking were the nozzles. For the sake of convenience and timing (I did not expect to have a lot of time for trial and error), I ordered a nozzle set from **********.com.

Unfortunately, I caught the flu the week leading up to my daughter’s birthday and was not able to start the project when I had hoped. It was only until the day of, Saturday, that I had recovered enough to leave the house. She had planned to have a sleep-over with several friends that night, so if I could build the thing that morning - things would be perfect.

I decided to make an external mix gun using ¼ inch galvanized pipe. Using standard nipples and fittings, I managed to get the familiar “E” shape together in an hour or two. A union was used to mate the pressure washer hose to the gun.

For the air, I used an 8 inch piece of copper tubing, fitted on one end with a standard quick connection and the nozzle on the other. The tubing was used so I could fine tune the alignment of the air and nucleation nozzles with a little bend or two. Hose clamps brought everything together, the air line to the gun, the gun to a 6 ft piece of 1” EMT conduit, and eventually the conduit to a 12 foot ladder.

The first indoor test was to try out one of the air compressors. The first one was rated at 4.7cfm @ 100psi, which was a bit less than what **********.com recommended. I was hoping to maintain about 40psi, but the compressor could only keep up at 20psi. with the **********.com nozzle. I ended up using a second compressor, a pancake style with an unknown rating. Together, they kept the pressure up to about 50psi.

Being concerned with noise, I decided to use an electric pressure washer. We had a 120V unit rated at 1500psi and 2.1gpm. By noon, I had everything loaded into a small utility trailer and headed back to the house.

Now, running two air compressors (about 14 amps each) and a pressure washer (17 amps) takes a bit of electricity. Getting power out to the trailer was going to be an issue. Fortunately, there was a 100amp panel installed near my heat pump but no receptables. It only took about an hour to add two circuits and outdoor receptacle. (I had been meaning to due this for a while anyway.) Did I tell you the family business was mechanical contracting?

The second issue was with the pressure washer hose. It was clogged and I wasted an hour trying to unclog it. I ended up going back to the shop to get a different hose.

Everything was finally hooked up by 4:30. After turning it all on and some alignment work at the nozzles, it looked like a real gun. I was amazed to see how fast it started turning the ground white, literally just 10-15 minutes. My children were making snow angels! I was a bit surprised because I thought the temp was still above 32F.

After analyzing the wind (and some input from the wife), I decided to move everything to another place in the yard. All of the hoses and cables were neatly routed through the shrubs, when I turned it on for good, about 5:30pm. Guests were arriving as the trees beginning to have that winter wonderland look.

It happened about 6:00pm, just as I was thinking about salting the walkway. It started with a crackle, then a pop or two. Then, I noticed that one of the air compressors had turned off. It looked like the air nozzle was getting clogged with ice. A quick climb up the ladder and a tap on the nozzle seemed to fix it. So off I went to the grocery store for some rock salt. When I returned, the lawn didn’t seem as white as I expected. The air was nearly clogged completely.

A trip inside with the air hose quickly thawed everything and after a quick purge it was back in operation - but not for long. The popping and crackling were back in about 10 minutes.

What was my mistake? From what I’ve read, using standard 3/8” air hose is not a good idea. I can now attest to that. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to run the gun for very long. But when it was working, it was better than what I expected. I plan to get a bigger air hose before the next snowmaking opportunity.

My disappointment was lessened a bit when I awoke the next morning. It was 40F outside with a light drizzle. Most of the show that I was able to make had melted. You can imagine the disappointment of my daughter and her friends. Thankfully, they gave me a rain check.

OK well besides the Snow at Home nozzle kit it seems like you did mostly everything pretty much right.

Your biggest issue is the air quick connect. The air hose may have frozen then you thawed that out but the quick connect was probably still frozen. Which caused it to freeze so quickly the second time. Try using a garden hose for your air line it wont freeze as fast if at all. Other than that good job throwing it all together so fast and getting it to work.

Just a hint, Now that you found this site NEVER EVER type www.Snow athome.com into your URL bar EVER again

Here are a few pictures. I'll try to get a video of it in action.

Here's a short video of the gun after about 15 minutes of operation.

video

I can't wait until I can run this thing all night.

was the ice forming where the air and water nozzles mix? i had that problem, and just had to adjust the positioning of the air nozzle.

No, the ice was forming in the air line. After disconnecting the hose, I could look down in the quick connect fitting and see ice.

I'm definately going to try a bigger hose.

My brother thinks that some sort of dryer or moisture trap might help, too. Something like a vertical tank that would allow the compressed air to cool back to ambient temperature before entering the line. Any moisture would condense in the tank and settle/freeze at the bottom. The outlet would be several inches from the bottom.

Another thing that I've found to help A LOT is before you start running, fill the compressor tanks all the way up, then just snap a quick connect male plug into the end of the hose to drain the tanks really fast. It will blow any condensed moisture out of the air line, so you're starting with a much dryer line. When I forget to do this, my lines will freeze up within minutes. I have yet to get a freezup when I've blown out the hoses.

I run 5/8th inner diameter high pressure hose with no quick connects, just a standard brass swivel and after running 6 hours or more if I take the hose off the inside around the metal; fitting has ice built inside. it isn't a problem because it never freezes all the way. But a 3/8th inch quick connect will freeze after about an hour.

Just grab some 150psi high burst strength hose and you'll be all set. My gun combo is a external mix too and the best thing is once you have it working you never have to adjust it. It is an on/off gun which makes life pretty easy.

ya just standard 5/8 garden hose will work just fine

I wonder why i never have a problem with freeze ups.. i have run with my quick connects for 3 hours, and never had an issue

quote:

i wonder why i never have a problem with freeze ups.. i have run with my quick connects for 3 hours, and never had an issue

well if you run at really low humidity it wont happen as fast

yeah, i guess its all circumstantial. i also leave my compressor inside, where the humidity is probably much lower

Well, wouldn't you know it? Mother nature helped us out today. Our first real snow in 6 years. Only a little more than an inch, but my children loved it. The best part is, they think that I had something to do with it!

I haven't tried the gun again, yet. Once I get some bigger hoses, I'll let you all know how it turns out.

Thanks for all of the input. This is a great site.

My compressor and pump are stationary in the basement & I run hoses out the window to make snow. For my slope I run sometimes 150' of 3/4" hose for my air. Obviously after 20-30 hrs of running, this starts to clog and the pressure builds in my air tank. I quickly swap out a dry hose and I'm off and running.

I also make snow w/ a short 'jumper' hose from time to time. It is the 12' hose I use from the compressor out the window so I don't have to drag the 100' hose through the window. Anyway with the short hose, I could run for days at a time w/ no ice buildup.

In looking at the BYB and that setup, I have never heard of an iced air line. Deductive reasoning is that it is only a 10' line (and run adjacent to the 'warm' water line.

So the point of my post, is keep your air line short and you should not have any ice issues. Longer airlines can be 'packaged' or wrapped next to the warmer water line to reduce freezing. For your particular gun, I would remove the quick connect, and insulate that copper air line. That is going to be a major freezing point for moisture in the air.

Great stories and best of luck to you. It is a fun and addicting hobby that offers so much joy.