[SEL] Ice harvest coming up next month

[Steve W.]

Germoamer at aol.com wrote:
>  
> In a message dated 1/30/2010 2:01:03 PM Eastern Standard Time,  
> falcon at telenet.net writes:
> 
> The plow  isn't made to cut completely through the ice sheet but to
> score it deep  enough that the cut guides the saw used later.
> 
> 
> Steve,
>  
> Could it also have been to cut a "crack line" that a wedge would have been  
> driven into and hit with a big hammer to break chunks off?  Just a  
> thought.  
>  
> 11 inches of snow and still falling!  
> 
> Tom  Schmutz
> Concord,  Va.
> germoamer at AOL.com

Tom,
 Not really. The ice has to be cut so it has square corners and straight
edges. Without them it is very hard to stack in the ice house. The plow
would cut down deep enough that the finish cutting was faster and straight.
Most ice houses were built to fit a certain number of blocks per layer
and each layer was stacked in a different direction to keep them stable.
Using a wedge would be faster, but there is no way to keep the cuts square.

-- 
Steve W.