Dock bubblers/circulators serve two purposes. First - they prevent the lake water from freezing around your pilings, cribs or dock posts and lifting them up as the lake level rises in the spring. Second - they create a "shock absorber" of open water around your dock to protect it from the expanding and shrinking ice mass during the winter as the sun slightly warms the ice during the days causing expansion and the frigid nighttime temps. cause shrinkage.
However, no bubbler or circulator will protect your dock from sheets of ice being blown by the wind in the spring when the ice begins to break up. Those sheets of ice often weigh many tons, and whatever they hit is going to be damaged to some degree. I've seen several instances where the previously mentioned tripod-style pilings that are supposed to protect a dock by diverting the flowing ice were totally destroyed, so in my opinion they are probably not worth the expense of having them installed. They may divert small sections of moving ice, but pretty much nothing is going to stop larger flowing ice masses from causing major damage.
We run two circulators (also called "aquatherms" or "ice eaters") each winter on a single 20 amp GFI-protected circuit.
__________________
DRH
|