VIDEO: An autonomous line marking machine that's been marking sidelines on sportsfields at Sir Jack Brabham Park and other Council sportsgrounds this season, is branching out to create its first image.
In short: A new robot line-marking machine saves time and money as local sportsfields are painted.
For the first time in Orange. the GPS-controlled machines is used to paint the image of a giant ribbon for an anti-domestic-violence campaign.
What's next: The lines on local sportsfields are re-painted 8 to 10 times every season.
This week the machine made its first trip to Wade Park to create the image of a giant white ribbon for a weekend game.
Orange United Warriors are planning a special focus on an anti-domestic-violence campaign for their last home game of the year this weekend. The Warriors play Blayney in the Woodbridge Cup Rugby League competition on Saturday 20 July.
On Wednesday it was the first chance to try the robot's capacity to create a pre-programmed image of a white folded ribbon, the symbol of the anti-domestic-violence campaign.
This year is the first season the 'Turf Tank' brand line-marker has been used in Orange. It has revolutionised the work of marking out Orange City Council's sportsfields across the city.
The unit's programming enables it to mark out soccer and rugby league fields at Sir Jack Brabham Park, Anzac Park, Bletchington Oval, Bloomfield Oval, Perry Oval, Max Stewart Park and Brendon Sturgeon Oval. The programming also includes the options of painting a wide range of sporting fields, including AFL and cricket.
When a local high school had to move an athletics event to Sir Jack Brabham Park recently because their own field wasn't suitable, the autonomous unit was brought in to paint the lines for an athletics running track.
For Orange City Council's sportsground crew, the pre-programming feature eliminates the time-consuming start-of-the-season manual chore of measuring out and marking every line by 'stringing out' across the fields. A process that traditionally takes multiple staff weeks to complete is now a matter of days for one staff member and the GPS-linked Turf Tank.
Depending on the weather, field use and how often fields need to be mown, Orange's sportsfields are repainted 12 to 15 times during a season.
The sportsfield crew's experience so far has shown the new unit also uses 40-50 per cent less paint than the former manual line-marking machines and completes each field 25 per cent faster.
