THE ICE TOWER
in winter and many of them can’t get to the hil ls or mountains as much as they want. So instead of using the tools on indoor plastic holds, they make ice walls. Some folks spray water on trees, others take it to the next level and build str uctures to freeze. It takes patience, some constr uction sk il ls and lots of water. If you decide to make a wall, plan properly.
Brad Fr iesen, who lives north of Winnipeg, was inspired by the Saint Boniface Alpine Club of Canada’s ice wall and built his own. “The tower was made using three hydro poles that were planted in the ground for the support. Then I framed up the wall and hung snow fence for the ice to for m on. I had to build a custom sprayer that spanned the width of the tower. For spraying I star ted near the bottom and then slowly raised the sprayer as the ice for med,” said Fr iesen.
The nearest natural ice to Winnipeg is in northwestern Ontario.” I can crawl out of bed in the morning and go do laps to start my day,” said Fr iesen, “My tower isn’t the only tower in Manitoba. A fr iend of mine has one in his backyard, so I had several resources to gather info from.”
The t wo t ypes of ice towers are free-standing ice towers and supported ice towers. A free-standing tower is made from water f lowing from a pipe or supported pipe that wil l not contr ibute to the strength of the tower. The supported tower is made from water f lowing vertical ly down from and along a human-made str ucture.–