Digital Signage Used In Ice Rinks

Ice hockey dynamic advertising is now proving to be a winner for several installations in the USA and Canada; electronic signage systems is now being fitted in several ice rinks due to the lower price as well as their quick return on investment.

First let us look at the design of the ice rink so we can fully understand what the digital advertising hardware has to deal with.

Ice Rink.

The word link converts in Scottish to course, this is an area that was and still is to this day used for the Scottish classic winter sport of curling

An inside ice rink.

These indoor ice rinks are built in layers, a concrete base is laid, with a series of pipes that has a chilled fluid inside, the chilled fluid is either be brine or a water mixture including antifreeze and this is embedded in the concrete. When water is sprayed on top of the cement it freezes due to the ultra low temperatures.

Due to the rink being built of layers a few inches thick, it is required to resurface the rink with more ice occasionally, as the ice rink warms up and with the wear of skaters and ice hockey teams slicing into the ice.

A siton machine named a Zamboni is used to resurface the ice and typically comes out and does its job in the breaks.

With most ice skating rinks being a regular 50 degrees Fahrenheit or 10 degrees Celsius this can cause some challenges with the electronics deployed. Envision using a home TV in this extreme environment what would transpire? Well over a short time period you would find that the TV would fail due to the heat in the tv screen causing condensation to form on internal parts and then corroding them.

Digital signage in an ice rink.

Now here the investment in the electronic signage hardware is important, as you dont want the investors pondering on their judgement to set up a digital signage solution that fails.

One certain way to protect the devices is to set up an LCD enclosure, these are a steel LCD enclosure that the hardware will fit into and can be attached from ceiling mounts and from the walls, perfect for advertising drinks and fast food for the break.

The LCD enclosure is fixed with a special cooling and heating method that is thermostatically controlled and can be adjusted, so when the temperature falls to below 65 degrees Fahrenheit, the heater starts to work and heats the internal equipment in the housing, then when the heat springs up past the preset temperature the heater switches off, this constant monitoring of the internal heat is vital to main the integrity of the internal hardware.

Without any shielding enclosure the digital advertising solution will have to be able to cope in an natural environment that almost none of the normal electronics can work in.

Once the equipment is in a safe environment the rink can gain from broadcasting news mixed with commercials, these advertising can include the rink shop, the next high profile match or even the meal deal at the fast food bistro.