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The recipe for making snow is pretty simple, really. Take some water, mix with a little bit of air, refrigerate, throw into the air, and boom! You’ve got yourself some snow. What’s amazing, however, is how complicated that process can be.

The several-dozen snow gun models from the major snowmaking companies—Ratnik, HKD, Snow Logic, TechnoAlpin, SMI, DemacLenko, Sufag, and others—are each designed for a particular application. And, of course, guns are just the last piece in the snowmaking food chain, connected to various hydrants, pumps, compressors, pipes, cooling towers, mounting platforms and carriages, and so on. Overlay all of that technology on the natural variables of terrain, temperature, humidity, wind, and manpower (along with unnatural budget constraints), and you’ve got yourself one, big, head-scratching (and fascinating) puzzle to solve.

At the most basic level, snowmaking technology breaks down into a choice between fan guns and air-water guns. With their own internal compressors, fan guns do not require piped air, as air-water guns do. They do, however, need electricity to operate, and hence, according to manufacturers, they are typically more popular in the Midwest and at smaller mountains that are often wired top to bottom. At Northeastern resorts, where the infrastructure historically comprises more air and water piping rather than electrical lines, air-water guns predominate.

Fans are considered best suited to cover large areas, where a long throw is an advantage, and in windy locations, as the plume can be controlled to a greater extent. Their onboard controllers also make them suited to automation, and the air/water mix can be adjusted to tune snow quality.

One manufacturer estimates that 60 to 70 percent of the snow made in America is with air-water guns, usually sticks or lances that are tower mounted. Narrower trails, where the long throws of fan guns aren’t necessary, are their forte. They typically function with a combination of water nozzles and nucleating nozzles. Ratnik’s popular four-stage Sky Giant VI represents a typical stick gun configuration, with two nucleating nozzles to “bombard” (Ratnik’s term) six water-only nozzles.

Another piece of the puzzle: snowmaking remains an ever-evolving, technological art. Technology has leapt forward at times in the last couple of decades with such innovations as tower guns and low-energy hardware. Often, though, the changes are subtle—a new nozzle aperture sizing or a new nucleation configuration, for instance. Automation, while not new, is just beginning to gain acceptance. Some technological upgrades are exceedingly expensive, while in other cases, a small investment can yield big steps forward in economy, efficiency, and snow quality. There’s a lot to consider.

More with Less

Start with what has probably been the biggest innovation in snowmaking technology in recent years—low-energy, or low-e, guns. Exactly what that means is not entirely clear; according to Robin Smith, in charge of business development at TechnoAlpin, a gun in Europe must be able to produce snow at under 25 cubic feet per minute (cfm) to be considered low-e. No such standard has yet been established in North America, but considering the standards of yesteryear’s guns, with cfm outputs often in the high triple digits, most guns made today are low-e.

But some are more low-e than others. Snow Logic’s DV4, based on the company’s patented dual vector technology, can make snow with as little as 5 cfm, earning the title of low-e champ. Dennis Kinsella, North American sales manager for DemacLenko, says that he has seen air flows go from 32 cfm to 16 cfm to 8 cfm in three years. “Can someone do it at 2 cfm in the future?” asks Kinsella. “Maybe.”

The amount of air needed to make quality snow obviously changes according to the wet bulb temperature—more warmth and humidity means more air. Super low-e guns, or guns operating at a super low-e setting, might be less effective at marginal temperatures approaching 28 degrees wet bulb.

Making snow in marginal conditions is, of course, the critical challenge for resort operators. Having key terrain open for early-season holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas can be the determining factor in overall profitability. In the era of climate change, that often means being able to take full advantage of brief windows of temperature opportunity. “Making snow at 15 degrees is not the contest any more,” says Smith. “It’s what you can do at 28 degrees.”

Mitch Dodson, president and co-founder of Snow Logic, insists that its DV4 guns, operating at between five and eight cfm at 28 degrees (with 50-degree water and 100-percent humidity), can produce “production snow,” a euphemism for what old-school skiers might call “base.” Ron Ratnik, president of Ratnik Industries, believes that, to make high-quality snow at marginal conditions, a gun operating at 50 to 100 cfm is most effective.

One Step at a Time

To adapt to changes in temperature, another evolution in technology has been underway: multi-phase guns. Top Gun’s best-selling air-water gun, for example, features nine water-flow settings; DemacLenko’s EOS 8 model has eight; and SMI’s new Freedom X has four water-flow settings and two variable air-flow settings. Each setting typically represents a difference of around one to two degrees Celsius.

Less expensive fixed-flow guns, like DemacLenko’s EOS 1, are good for locations where temperatures are more consistent, oftentimes on the marginal side. But for locations where temperatures might frequently vary, multi-phase guns allow snowmakers to adapt to changing conditions. Sufag’s Taurus 2.0 tower gun, for example, has solenoid valves in the head that automatically manage adjustments to one of its eight different “production thresholds” according to the temperature, using 14 to 21 cfm. And HKD’s Impulse R5 air-water model combines five different water-flow settings with variable airflow. The gun can produce snow at between eight and 48 cfm, aided by hybrid nucleation.

HKD has focused much of its technological effort on its nozzle design, although the company is somewhat tight-lipped about the exact nature of its newest designs. (“If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” HKD president Charles Santry says half-jokingly.) But the fact is, tiny changes in the aperture size and configuration of a nozzle, both for water flow and nucleation, can make enormous differences.

So can the material of the nozzle, at least when it comes to durability. Ratnik claims that his company’s stainless steel nozzles have a longer lifespan than brass nozzles, while Santry estimates a typical nozzle lifespan to be between three and five years, depending on the cleanliness of the water and air pumped through the system. Ceramic nozzles, with a longer lifespan, might be an option, although the expense could be prohibitive.

Fan Guns

With their heavy output and long throws (up to 200 feet), fan guns can create the appearance of being energy hogs. But according to Joe VanderKelen, president of SMI, “Fan gun technology got a lot better in the late ’80s and early ’90s. Fan guns are a lot better now at marginal temperatures.” That has come about, says VanderKelen, through improvements in nucleation, among other technological advances. SMI’s Super Polecat fan gun, for example, can produce a barrage of quality snow at the 28-degree wet-bulb threshold, utilizing a minimum of 10 to 16 water nozzles fed by a single nucleating nozzle with six jets.

As snowmakers work to take advantage of what Smith calls “intermittent windows of marginal opportunities”—especially early in the season—the ability to make large amounts of snow quickly is at a premium. Fan guns have a bit of an edge in colder temperatures, but that edge shrinks in marginal conditions. Ratnik says that stick guns typically max out at about 60 to 70 gallons per minute (gpm), while a warhorse fan gun like the TechnoAlpin TF 10 can crank out up to 200 gpm in ideal conditions. But output diminishes dramatically as temperatures rise; Smith estimates a good stick gun at startup temp uses 10-12 gpm, and a fan at startup is around 15-18 gpm. Overall, Smith says output at 28 degrees may be less than a third of what it might be at 18 degrees for both sticks and fans.

Of course, output isn’t the only consideration in the choice of a fan gun. TechnoAlpin’s newest gun, the TR 8, is much smaller than its big bro, the TF 10. But smaller and lighter (and with simpler internal workings; a single axle drives both the fan and the compressor), it might be a better choice for applications where mobility is at a premium. And where a finer, lighter snow might be needed, Sufag’s Access gun breaks water into fine particles through an array of 300 nozzles (although that configuration is not recommended when using water full of nozzle-clogging impurities).

Weighing the Options

With so many choices for new snowmaking technology, how is a resort to decide? Mount Snow in Vermont might offer an instructive case study. Incentivized by deep discounts through Efficiency Vermont’s 2014 Great Snowgun Round-up, Mount Snow swapped old equipment for 645 new guns, completely reshaping its arsenal to low-e.

Mount Snow had been running a previous generation of air-water guns that typically ran at 220 to 450 cfm. According to Brendan Ryan, VP of special projects for Peak Resorts, Mount Snow’s owner, the resort went to three companies for replacements. On areas of the mountain where water pressure was low, says Ryan, the best solution was an array of Ratnick Baby Snow Giant X-2s. For “secondary” terrain, the resort went with HKD Impulses, able to make snow at 110 cfm in marginal conditions and at a much lower cfm in colder temperatures. And for special circumstances—e.g., parks—in cold-weather conditions, the resort invested in Snow Logic DV4s.

Mount Snow did not replace, however, 254 SMI Super Polecat and Polecat fan guns, used to make snow on its most critical terrain. Fan guns, of course, need electricity, but Mount Snow has been wired top to bottom for years to power chairlifts. And, while far more expensive to buy than air-water guns, fan guns, according to Ryan, are hard to beat when it comes to making a lot of snow quickly and efficiently.

The Challenge of Automation

With four different manufacturers in play, Mount Snow’s configuration points to one of the big obstacles in the next step forward in snowmaking technology: automation. Automation is more widespread now in Europe than it is in North America, largely because most European resorts came to snowmaking later in the game than did their North American counterparts. Starting with a blank slate, they were able to enter the automation world with fewer logistical challenges or retrofitting.

Most North American resorts, on the other hand, are, like Mount Snow, updating older snowmaking systems by adapting on the fly with a mix of guns and infrastructure from various manufacturers. To date, no reliable automation framework has been developed to coordinate multiple manufacturers, and for a snowmaker to manage, say, three different automation systems can not only be logistically challenging, but also cost-prohibitive.
In addition, retrofitting an existing system to accommodate automation can be exorbitantly expensive. “Resorts have made huge investments in manual [systems], and it works,” says Smith. So if it ain’t broke, why try to fix it?

Inevitably, however, even with small steps to start, automation is coming. Manufacturers agree that with sporadic windows of temperature opportunity, especially early in the season, automation can be a valuable asset. Having decent early-season snow might represent the tipping point between loss and profitability for some resorts.

And, for those few resorts that haven’t invested heavily in snowmaking, automation can be an easier choice to make now. Case in point: After protracted negotiations to acquire permits for snowmaking, Arizona Snowbowl began operating a fully automated system of 35 SMI fan guns in 2012. However, Snowbowl’s decision to automate was more in line with the European paradigm. “We went from no snowmaking to a lot of snowmaking in a single step,” says general manager J.R. Murray. Automation has enabled the resort to tweak its snowmaking plant to adapt to what Murray calls “micro-climates on the mountain.”

For resorts with long-established systems in place, however, the leap into full automation might be too big to take.

Innovation in Automation

Yet there are opportunities to take tentative steps into the world of automation. Kinsella says, “Automating one primary trail or a learning area could get you those extra hours needed to open it early that a manual system wouldn’t.”

Snow Logic has introduced its Rapid Fire automation technology that is wireless, battery-charged, and able to be moved as guns are moved. The upfront capital investment for automation is the obvious downside, but Dodson says, “The ROI becomes much better when you can move [a gun] four or five times rather than having it at a fixed location.”

Jay Collins of Sufag says that Sufag’s focus moving forward is on “integrated” automation that works with a variety of different hardware. “It can be done,” Collins says confidently. He believes that “all the snow gun technology is good—almost at the limits of the laws of physics.”

But Troy Jervas, president of Top Gun, which has not pursued automation technology, is more skeptical. “I think the jury is still out on whether automation will pay for itself,” he says. However, Top Gun’s primary clients are smaller areas, where the benefits of automation might be minimal.

Newcomer Snowgun Technologies is taking an alternative approach to maximizing marginal temperature windows. For manual systems, it has designed its Sledgehammer air-water gun to “convert high volumes of water very quickly at marginal temperatures,” says Tyler Fairbank, CEO of The Fairbank Group, Snowgun Technologies’ parent company. According to Fairbank, “flow and volumes can be brought up very quickly with this gun,” which can produce 44 gallons a minute at 300 psi at start-up temperatures.

For all the advances in technology, there is no, single snowmaking model applicable to all resorts. Climate, mountain size, budget, and the age of an existing system are all factors that dictate the direction of any upgrade. It is fair to say, however, that low-e technology is not just the way of the future, but the way of the present. The energy savings alone make the conversion to current low-e firepower “a no-brainer,” according to one resort executive. Whether that means fan guns or low-e towers depends on many variables, which the experts, some mentioned here, can help you sort through.