Coming up in the next month or two, you will begin to notice the agronomy staff doing a number of things to our fairways- aerifying, verticutting and sanding. The weather during March and April is very touch-and-go with the days jumping from nice and dry to miserable and wet in the blink of an eye. Weather is the primary factor that determines how fast all of the aforementioned practices occur not because we don't like to work in the rain, but because our equipment is heavy and we do not want to cause any unnecessary damage to the turf.
Experience has taught us that we must be ready to take advantage of ideal weather conditions at a moment's notice. This is why our head mechanic, Rick has spent the last month readying every piece of equipment involved in this process. Every Spring and Fall when we send this equipment out, things get worn out- belts, tines, blades, bearings, chains and so on. It is amazing how hard our golf course can be on our equipment and our mechanic.
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| Rick taking a look at the condition of our blades and paddles on the drum. |
Here is a quick look at the blades from our Wiedenmann Super 500 that we use to verticut fairways. Rick spent three straight days replacing all of these blades and paddles on the drum inside the machine. Very tedious work as he had to clean the threads of each nut and bolt of dirt and rust for each individual assembly, remove the old stuff, slide on the new one and then bolt on the new blades and paddles. All of this had to be done in a 6" wide access point, making for some challenging work with hand tools. The blade on the top of the picture below is brand new and the one on the bottom is a worn-out blade that was replaced. Notice the difference between the two? It is pretty apparent that we wore these out pretty good last fall. Thanks for all of your hard work Rick!
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| Worn out blade vs. brand new blade from the Wiedenmann Super 500 verticutter. |
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| Here is how the blades and paddles are arranged on the drum inside the machine. |
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