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Ballyliffin Golf Club

Ballyliffin Golf Club - March 2008

“Hebrides, Malin Head, Rockall; force 7 and driving rain”

This seemed to be the forecast every day for the 4 months that it took Ocmis to install the system at Ballyliffin Golf Club. Six miles south of Malin Head on the northern coast of Southern Ireland these two courses offer real links golf in a spectacular setting. The winter rain and wind was however a daily challenge to the huge task of installing the irrigation system to these wonderful golf courses.

The replacement irrigation system was designed by Adrian Mortram of Robin Hume Associates for the Old Course and Glashedy links and included full fairway watering to both courses as well as the three practice holes. The club elected to use Toro equipment, including the new Toro GDC controller. Ocmis’ experience of installing this new control system was a great reassurance for the club in what was a huge investment, the largest since the new club house was built.

The water is abstracted from boreholes and stored in a new 540,000 litre steel storage tank adjacent to the new greens maintenance complex. This complex is cleverly screened by sand dunes so that it cannot be seen from the course, and the new 4.5m tall tank was constructed within a very tight area between the buildings and the surrounding sand embankment. The club refurbished an existing building to detailed drawings prepared by Ocmis, and this was used to house the new pump station. The pumps deliver 95m³/hr from three 11kw pumps operated through individual variable speed drive units. The speed of the pumps, and the power used, varies with the water demand of the system. This is a major power saving feature and also reduces wear and tear on the pipe work, valves and sprinklers. The pump station was constructed in the Ocmis workshops using Lowara pumps and an automatic self flushing system with Ocmis controls.

The statistics of the new system are impressive. 50,000 metres of pipe, 2000 sprinklers, 60,000metres of cable and all installed and operating in 16 weeks! Ocmis’ motivation and attention to detail is crucial when installing a system of this complexity to a tight programme. There isn’t time to go back and sort out errors and everything has to be right first time.

The undulating fairways, particularly on the Old Course, made the sprinkler positioning and pipe installation more difficult. In some places the level changes 3metres in 10metres, and Ocmis used specialist moleploughs from their fleet of machinery that had suitable flexibility on the rear linkage to maintain the specified pipe depths. The Toro sprinklers and control system enable the angle of the jets and the run sequences to be adjusted to accommodate the severe slopes.

The system was completed at the end of March, and immediately received its first real test. A two month drought preceded the Irish Seniors Open at the course in June 2008. The new irrigation system played a crucial part in ensuring excellent playing conditions for the tournament.

Ocmis continue to provide service support and maintenance for the system. To prepare the system for the winter Ocmis drain the water and use compressed air to blow the water out of the control valves and sprinklers around the course. In the spring the system is re-commissioned by gradually filling and purging the air from the pipe work, checking the operation of the sprinklers around the course using the hand held remote control system, and ensuring the computer and pumps are all operating correctly.

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