Choose Artificial Grass Specifically Designed for Residential Use

Eco Synthetic Turf Solutions with Tom Diehl

<Industry Update>

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Some synthetic turf companies’ continue to sell the wrong grass to homeowners. The ‘football field grass’ in question was designed and engineered specifically for sport fields and fails to meet the current needs for landscape and leisure use. The process of installing this turf calls for tons of black rubber crumb as an infill installed between the blades of grass. Rubber crumb has been shown to be flammable and toxic. Kids using this turf for recreation may be exposed to harmful fumes from the recycled tires.

You might ask, how can this happen? A few years ago some companies’ started experimenting using ‘football field grass’ for something other than sports stadiums. There hope was for a whole new market to open up and the ‘football field grass’ would cross-over and work just as well in the average homeowners backyard. The marketing worked as planned, but the product did not. This idea was a disaster for consumers. They were sold on the notion that there new synthetic lawn would last 25-30 years with little or no maintenance. They were told it would be visually appealing and long lasting for years to come. A premium price was put on the turf as it was marketed as the preferred choice of the National Football League.

After all, if big 300 pound football players trample all over it and it rebounds, it must be the perfect choice for your home. There was one problem. When synthetic turf was designed for athletic fields including N.F.L. stadiums, they intentionally designed a blade and fiber system that was very sparse. Engineers created a wide gap between individual blades, on purpose, to allow for massive amounts of crumb rubber to be packed into it. The rubber crumb acted as the perfect cushion for athletes, thus preventing concussions and other serious knee and joint injuries. What was a breakthrough for sports fields and athletes turned out to be bomb for homeowners.

Upon installation of football field grass in one’s yard, a chief complaint from consumers is that when they look down on there new lawn they see mostly a black rubber crumb lawn instead of green blades of grass. This isn’t surprising considering massive amounts of rubber crumb are used during the installation process. It looks like an invasion of billions of black ants in your lawn. When children play on the grass, the crumb rubber gets all over the place, in kids shoes, hair, and for toddlers, possibly in there mouth. The lack of density with field grass is an asthetic problem when trying to use it on homes when a plush green lawn is preferred. Also, don’t expect your new field style synthetic turf to be little or no maintenance, as the sales consultants claim when they sell this stuff.

This is a big problem if you have pets. Consumers are lead to believe this grass is pet friendly. It is touted as the perfect pet grass, recommended for installations in dog-runs, backyards and kennels. The companies’ message is clear that dog urine is fine for ‘football field grass’ and urine will pass right through the backing into the sub-base. Unfortunately, there is little evidence showing that urine and sports grass are compatible. No such testing was ever done and it’s hard to imagine that during the design stages for synthetic sport fields, testing for urine on turf was a priority. The verdict is still out whether or not dog urine will destroy synthetic grass over time, but the facts are certainly in on recycled rubber crumb and pet urine.

In a short amount of time, even with light pet use, the permeable rubber crumb in ‘football field grass’ absorbs pet urine and before you know it, you have an extreme odor problem in and around your backyard lawn. Crumb rubber is 81.82% porous and is the perfect environment for germs, mold and odors to flourish. The thick pile of rubber crumb quickly becomes a breeding ground for dangerous bacteria, some of which has the potential to cause serious skin infections. Companies’ selling this ‘football field grass’ admit that 75% of there customers are dog owners and acknowledge most of this group purchase for the doggie benefits.

Field grass is the wrong turf for residential use and clearly should not be sold as a pet friendly alternative to natural grass. It is clear that in a growing industry where there are numerous benefits to the latest versions of landscape synthetic grass, it is unfortunate that older sports varieties give synthetic grass in general, an inflated perception about it’s price and a deflated feeling about it’s value. This is simply not true. The good news is that current technology has never been more advanced for residential synthetic grass and we now have more quality products than ever before at affordable prices. Cleaner and safer infills that are non-absorbent are now available and highly recommended as an alternative to black crumb rubber.The claims about synthetic grass being pet friendly are absolutely true with the proper infills which do not absorb external elements.

Do your homework and stick to synthetic turf manufacturers and products specifically engineered for home use. Be wary of pushy sales people who will tell you anything to get you to sign a contract. But what about you homeowners stuck with football style synthetic grass with billions of black rubber granules oozing odors out of your lawn? There is some good news. Removal of most of this crumb rubber is possible. With a high-pressure vacuum system and an experienced crew familiar with turf rejuvenation, replacing your infill with a greener, cleaner, and safer material is now possible.

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Source by Tom Diehl