Perisher, Australia's Favourite Ski Resort, continues to offer guests an experience of a lifetime and there's nothing quite like skiing and boarding freshly groomed terrain.
The company is the world’s best How Does a Snow Groomer Work supplier. We are your one-stop shop for all needs. Our staff are highly-specialized and will help you find the product you need.
Snow grooming ensures guests are provided with safe and high quality skiing and snowboarding surfaces day in day out.
Perisher is home to the largest fleet of snow groomers (snow cats) in Australia with 20 machines including; 4 winch cats and 5 specific terrain park cats working every night to keep the mountain in tip, top condition.
Perisher's snow cats range from the a Bombardier, which is used as the Pipe cutter to the latest Prinoth Bison X. Ongoing investment in grooming machinery continues with the purchase and addition of another AU$410,000 Prinoth Bison X winch snow groomer to the fleet this year. This is the third Bison X snow groomer added to the Perisher grooming fleet in recent, taking the total investment in excess of AU$1.2 million.
How does it work?
A snow grooming machine has two large rubber and steel tracks that disperse the weight of the machine evenly across the snow surface and cut into the snow to assist with climbing. Mounted on the front is a multi-directional blade that cuts and levels the snow surface before driving over it. A power tiller on the rear churns the snow to an even consistency before a large, heavy comb then drags across the surface leaving a corduroy finish on the snow.
The ultimate snow grooming machine can climb steep slopes, push heavily compacted snow and leave a seamless trail of corduroy in its wake. Specialty machines can winch on extremely steep terrain and have attachments for carving perfect half-pipes and other features.The blades, which are mounted on the front of the machines, have twelve movement capabilities which allows difficult-to-access snow to be groomed on the slopes as well.
The grooming team have one of the most important jobs on the mountain. They are responsible for turning lumps and bumps into turn-tastic corduroy, moving and farming snow, building, maintain and reshaping terrain parks and pipes, and constructing competition standard mogul and downhill race courses. Groomers are also a crucial part of operation on a pow day, often required to dig out lifts when things get a little deep.
At present the Perisher grooming crew has 225 years of experience between them. There are 40 staff from around the world - 32 groomers and 8 park staff on day crew. Perisher operators are among the best in the world in this highly specialised field, many work back-to-back seasons often sought out for their skill and work culture.
The Perisher grooming team also have round-the-clock mechanics working alongside them, the both support and keep the team (snow cats) going throughout the long winter season.
It's all about the corduroy! (Well, sort of) The Perisher Grooming Team can groom / maintain a huge amount of skiiable terrain in a single night including: Over 100 trails, 5 parks, 1 mini pipe, 2 rider cross courses, 1 world-class mogul course and lift tracks inc. uploads and unloads, PLUS more across the 4 resort areas of Perisher Valley, Blue Cow, Smiggin Holes.
During a winter season, the grooming fleet can log up between 12,000 and 15,000 hours depending on the season and groom approximately 33% of the 1,245 hectares of skiable area most nights (about 412 hectares)
Fun Facts:
Grooming is predominantly a night operation consisting of two shifts - 4 p.m. to 12 midnight and 12 midnight to about 9 a.m. In some circumstances grooming may also occur during the day, however this is kept to a minimum for safety reasons
A daily grooming report is available to the public each morning on the online Snow Report or via the Perisher App.
GROOMING REPORT
For over 30 years, Rip Collins has been grooming snow at Alta Ski Area in Utah.
Each night, after everyone else has left the mountain, Collins and his crew load into their grooming machines, also called snow cats, and begin knocking down moguls and smoothing roughed up snow.
The Alta grooming crew, like many others, is nocturnal, working two overnight shifts from 5:00 p.m. to 8:30 a.m.
Their goal? To transform the mountain by morning, replacing 'used' snow with smooth pristine corduroy on runs designated as 'groomed.'
At it's most basic, snow grooming is how resorts and ski areas prepare snow so that their guests can have the best possible skiing and riding experience.
As Charles Blier, Prinoth Vice-President of Sales for North America explains 'Grooming is all about the last six inches of snow surface ' what it looks like and feels like, first thing in the morning.
Using large tractors, equipped with blades on the front and tillers on the back, snow cat operators spend each night rearranging, smoothing and reforming this top six inches of snow.
With each pass over the snow, the front blade mows down moguls, churns up crud, and grinds the snow, while the rear tiller erases the snowcat tracks, smoothing everything out and leaving a white carpet of lightly lined snow, that looks like corduroy fabric (hence, the name).
An aerial look at a variety of freshly groomed snow.In addition to keeping skiers and riders happy, grooming also helps ski resorts keep their snow in the best condition possible.
Ski areas are subject to the whims of Mother Nature.
At one extreme, snow falls and everyone enjoys a powder day.
At the other extreme, there's a shortage of natural snowfall and groomers have to incorporate manmade snow into the compacted surface.
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Other natural factors, such as temperature, wind and sunlight can also change up how the grooming crew works.
According to Rip Collins, good grooming is an art.
'We want a perfect product when we groom. We train our operators to make the best skiing experience, which also makes it safer.
'Every time I groom a path, I strive to make the corduroy pristine. Every time we groom, the snow cats and operators create a blank canvas for skiers to lay tracks on.'
In addition to laying down perfect corduroy, snow cats are also used to build freestyle terrain parks, skier and snowboard cross courses and Terrain Based Learning beginner areas.
Terrain Based Learning is a learn-to ski and snowboard program developed by SNOW Operating in partnership with Prinoth and 42 resorts across North America and in Australia.
The goal of Terrain Based Learning is to make learning to ski and snowboard easier and more natural.
A Snow Operating/Prinoth snowcat creating Terrain-Based Learning features that make learning to ski or snowboard easier. Photo: PrinothUsing snow cats, resorts build mini-slopes, half pipes, rollers, banked turns and other small features for beginners. As beginners slide gently downhill on these features they learn to balance and turn. As the terrain moves gently uphill, they learn to stop naturally.
Vermont's Killington Resort has a large Terrain Based Learning program, with two dedicated teaching areas. Paul Buhler, a Killington groomer and ski instructor, grooms these areas and has learned what works best at Killington.
'At Killington, many of our features are built below grade. For example, our banked 'S' turns are carved into the trail. Other resorts build these above grade. It really depends upon each resort's topography, wind, water, access to snowmaking and the snow cats available to do the best job.'
Terrain Based Learning on a machine-created and groomed slope. By learning to glide uphill against gravity, beginners learn to stop. Photo: Seven Springs Mountain Resort, Pennsylvania.Race course preparation is another specialized type of snow grooming.
World Cup and Olympic race courses need to be frozen and fast.
The process starts at the beginning of the season with snowmaking. Then, through a process of tilling, grooming and reblading, groomers homogenize the snow into a solid, hard race surface.
In , Snowbasin Resort in Utah hosted the Olympic Downhill for men and women. Downhill courses are notoriously steep and the venues at Snowbasin are no different.
Winch cats are used for grooming steep pitches and were used for the Olympics at Snowbasin.
A winch cat is a snowcat mounted with a cable that extends from the cat to anchors on the ski run. The cable holds the weight of the snowcat as it travels down the hill and when the cat gets to the bottom of the pitch it turns around and the cable helps pull it back up the hill.
In addition to grooming downhill and other race courses, winch cats can be to groom any steep run. They are also used to move snow uphill when necessary. Because winch cats harness the power of the winch and cable, they are more energy efficient than traditional snow groomers, according to Blier.
Operating a winch cat is a specialized skill because the cable adds an extra component to the grooming.
Since winch cats do not fleet groom (when all the snow cats follow each other up the run side by side staggered diagonally across the hill) or pair groom (when two snow cats work together), a winch cat operator spends the night working alone, communicating with other groomers to help them avoid the cable.
Fleet grooming at Killington, Vermont. Photo: Killington.Snow grooming takes a lot of skill and developing this skill takes time on the job.
Novice drivers basically begin as apprentices, working with experienced operators and taking turns controlling the groomer until they are ready for their own machine.
Like every job, there are tradeoffs and rewards.
Inside a snow cat grooming machine at Killington. Photo: Killington.Operators also have to stay alert while working through the night and to accept responsibility for safety, both for themselves and other groomers. They are also responsible for providing the best snow possible, every day of the ski season.
As for the rewards, here are three: Groomers get to drive a big, fascinating machine. They know that skiers and snowboarders appreciate and enjoy their work. And, since they work all night, they've got at least some time each day to ski.
No wonder Rip Collins has been at it for over 30 years.
Enjoy!
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