Tru Mark Athletic Field Marker representative, Mark Hall, along with Darrell Ervasti of D. Ervasti Sales Co. visited the Fargodome, Fargo, ND on May 17, 2007.

It is time for a synthetic turf face lift as the existing turf paint has faded and needs to be repainted. The short dense (no infield material) synthetic turf is about 7 years old with inlaid lines for the football field except for logos, hash marks, and outside boundary markings. The synthetic turf is one continuous cover and is rolled and stowed when not used. The field paint needs to wear well and not flack off due to the rolling operations.

Several months later the team went back to apply the first of two coats of TrailBlazer Solar Trail field marking paint. Refer to the on-line album for images.

D. Ervasti Sales provided their newest paint formulation, TrailBlazer Solar Trail, a permanent field marking paint for synthetic turf (paint application for nylon, polypropylene, and polyethylene or a combination turf fibers). The enclosed images are the paint application using a Graco FieldLazer (RAC 5 standard spray tip LL5521) without use of the paint shields. The hash marks being painted are the perimeter marks around indoor football field.

Solar Trail is a permanent synthetic turf paint and was applied with no dilution which is the recommendation of the manufacturer.

The Solar Trail Label and MSDS recommends that the paint should dry completely within 6-8 hours.

Also demonstrated was the Solar Wash cleaning agent which was used a couple of times to clean up due to a paint drip or mistake was made during application. This product can also be used to remove the paint after it has dried.

With a short dense field turf the spray tip was within inches of the surface.

Tru Mark found that the paint flowed well and application was uniform while using the Graco FieldLazer. Although not tested the RAC 5 spray tip LL5419 would be recommended since the paint was not diluted.

Stay tuned for more field marking demonstrations.