One of the common questions I’m asked is if it is ok to leave a dock in the ice. The quick answer is usually no. Ice moves and expands and for the same reasons you don’t leave your boat in the ice, you don’t want to leave docks in the ice as they can be destroyed when the ice moves.
In some occasions ice in the woods on nature boardwalks heaves the ground and doesn’t move much but small movements of ice can snap bolts and crack welds. Even an inch of ice on a lake can form around a dock and move enough to bend things out of square. The layer of ice may be an inch deep but the width can be the size of the water body. As the lake level changes, ice along the shore will tilt as one edge sits on land. Take poles or dock legs frozen in the ice vertically and now tilt them with that ice layer that has a solid grip on the legs and you will see the dock faces destruction. If your dock is wood, the slight tilting of the pipe brackets bolted to the frame will split the wood grain open like an axe to a the end of a board. If the frame is aluminum, something is going to give and usually a weld first. Docks that float are better off in the ice than docks on legs but still can face destruction in the path of moving or expanding ice. Some customers on small ponds do not see any movement to cause a problem and they may swear that I am wrong about this.
A local law here in Maine insists that docks and moorings are temporary and must be removed 7 months out of the year. These reasons are why Great Northern Docks products are made portable for ease of installation and removal. The DuraLITE Docks have optional decking choices to make them easier to move by hand with empty aluminum frames. The FeatherLITE Docks are made with light weight perforated decking and a lighter weight frame. Both Aluminum docks are a closed tube extrusion welded inside and out for superior strength. The MPD’s are modular floating dock blocks that come apart in pieces to be moved by hand. If you are building a wood dock, Great Northern Docks has dock plans for sections that can be handled by one or two people along with dock hardware for reinforcement and attachment of pipe leg hardware or post leg hardware. If you are in a waterbody that is suitable for a floating dock you may find these are easier to install because they float to your location and bolt together without the process of leveling and installing dock legs. Great Northern Docks offers the most popular DuraLITE floating alumunum docks, the MPD (modular plastic docks) or DIY hardware for wood framed floating docks and wood floating dock plans.
Great Northern Docks boardwalks that stay in year round like the Orono Bog Boardwalk are semi-floating and have special hinges that allow some shifting of a frozen bog with minimal ice movement.
When I hear about the ice causing problems, I call it “dock damage from ice jamage“.
Over the years, I’ve seen systems destroyed in the ice and I can explain a few that come to mind and how ice damage occurred to the docks. I’ve also seen a few docks that are in the ice and knock on wood, are still intact.
The first dock I’ve seen was a roller dock that was rolled out of the lake and sat 30′ away from the waters edge. On the day the ice melted from the lake the wind had blown south sending the large body of ice to the north end of the lake. The wind shifted north sending the large body of ice back down the lake where it piled up on shore crushing everything in its path. The ice piled up above the waters edge and turned the large wooden roller dock into a pretzel.
Second was a concrete dock with vertical pipes attached to the outside for mounting C-shape boat bumper strips. The concrete has cracks but mainly holds together with 3′ of ice all around it every winter. The rugged 1.5″ schedule 40 galvanized pipe that extended into the ice was bent and pulled away from the wall needing replacement in the spring. Most of the brackets holding the pipe to the wall had snapped bolts and were also in need of replacement.
The third on my mind was a brand new aluminum dock left in the ice in the late fall with one inch of ice forming on the lake around it in a small cove. The owner was not worried and once I saw it and called him to explain it needed to come out, he didn’t rush but a couple weeks later hired a crew to remove it but the damage was done. The lake was dropping and the decking panels did not fit in the bent frames as they were now out of square. This is not to say that aluminum docks are not strong, however, the ice is forceful when it expands. This is similar to ice expanding in the block of your boat engine and cracking the block. More ice throughout the winter would cause greater damage but even in the early stages of icing, damage can occur.
The fourth incident on my mind were a few sections that are usually high out of the water that get left in to save on removal and installation cost, most neighboring dock owners made the same mistake. The cold November rain caused the the lake to rise as temps were dropping, a 4″ layer of ice formed around the edge of the lake. As the lake level receded a few days later, the layer of ice rested flat on the slope of the beaches around the lake bending every dock leg in sight. Most were wood docks and the the bolts sheered off or the wood stringers split open.
The fifth was a boardwalk in a forest with a small stream running beneath it. An aluminum frame had cracked welds as if a tree had fallen on it or a moose tried to walk on it. I was puzzled because I could not see how it survived 5 years but on the 6th winter it was destroyed. The volunteer that met me at the public boardwalk mention how now it’s so wonderful that beavers had just moved into the area and dammed it up turning the woods into a shallow pond. I then realized the area gets flooded and ice was the cause of the broken welds.
These examples are just the tip if the iceberg.
It is my advice to store your dock in a safe place where ice forces will not creep up on it.
Covering your dock keeping good ventilation is wise to protect it from the elements and extend it’s longevity.
Storing the dock panels in the frames rather than leaning them on a tree will hold them square and keep people from tripping onto the frames when hidden beneath the snow.
Fall is a great time to perform maintenance and get parts or accessories ready for the exciting day when you can reinstall your dock in the spring and enjoy the open water season.