Newer Zambonis, the ones you see at NHL rinks, are in the $60,000-range. Each rink must have a two-Zamboni garage because the NHL requires each team to keep two ice resurfacing machines on hand.
As it turns out, the ice resurfacing trade is a cold, cold business. It's probably a tribute to the success of the Zamboni that there are 13 rival companies out there, eight in Canada and five in the U.S. The Mighty Ducks use Zambonis, but the Kings use Olympias.
However, there's nothing like the original, says Richard Zamboni.
"We've been out there the longest and we feel strongly that we're the best," he said.
They've got to be the most diversified. For instance, what other ice resurfacing machine company has its own Web site--http://www.zamboni.com? That's where you can read up on the history of the Zamboni, cast your vote for your favorite Zamboni driver, buy Zamboni caps and Zamboni kid clothes, send somebody a Zamboni greeting card or even surf (skate?) to related sites through Zamboni's "Ice Cool Links."
Sounds pretty cool. So it's probably a good thing that Frank Zamboni didn't wind up naming his new company what he'd originally wanted to. Lucky for him, Paramount Engineering was already taken.
"He figured Zamboni would still be available," Richard Zamboni said.
In the end, the inventor became famous too. Frank changed Paramount from a city that once billed itself as "the hay capital of the world" to something like Zamboniland. He was inducted into the Ice Skating Institute of America, the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame and even received an honorary doctorate of engineering from Clarkson University in Potsdam, N.Y.
Meanwhile, his invention achieved great heights of popularity, even for an ice-resurfacing machine.
Cartoonist Charles Schultz bought two Zambonis for his rink and he often uses one Zamboni in his "Peanuts" strip. On the TV show "Cheers," Carla's husband Eddie Lebec was killed when he was run over by a Zamboni. A group called the Gear Daddies had a cult hit with a song that had the refrain "I wanna drive the Zamboni." During the Christmas season, Santa often drives a Zamboni at NHL rinks.
At top speed, the Zamboni travels at 9 mph. And even at that speed, in 50 years, the Zamboni sure has covered a lot of ice.
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)
The Zamboni
How the Zamboni resurfaces ice in a rink.
1. SHAVING: A blade shaves ice off the surface
2. COLLECTING THE SHAVING: A screw conveyor system propels shavings into snow collection tank. Shavings are later dumped away from ice surface.
3. WASHING THE ICE: Water is fed to the ice washing system and flushes dirt from grooves in ice. Dirty water is vacuumed up, filtered and returned to water tank.
4. RENEWING THE ICE: A towel spreads a thin coat of fresh hot water onto the ice.
Source: Zamboni USA
