Start With the Building, Not the Catalogue

A rink is a specific kind of room: long, cold, and seated along the sides rather than behind an end. That shapes three decisions before any model is chosen.

• Where can a scoreboard hang? An end wall, a side wall, or the roof. That answer decides whether you are looking at a flat-mounted cabinet or a centre-hung assembly, and it is usually the building's answer rather than yours.
• How far is the farthest seat? At roughly 25 feet of viewing distance per inch of digit height, the 12 in. digits on the indoor models read to about 300 feet and the 9 in. digits to about 225. In most municipal rinks and club arenas that covers the seating comfortably; measure to the seat that is genuinely farthest, not to centre ice.
• Who needs to read what? The crowd needs Points and the clock. The benches and the penalty box need Penalty Times, and they read from closer. Where the scoreboard hangs affects who can see which figure.

Answering those three narrows the catalogue to one or two cabinets. Doing it in the other order - picking a model and then finding somewhere for it - is how rinks end up with a scoreboard the roof cannot carry or a face the far end cannot read.

Indoor or Outdoor: Two Different Products

The outdoor model is not an indoor model rated for weather. It is a separate scoreboard: the LX7860 takes the features of the standard indoor hockey model into an outdoor package with all digits at 11 in., a 4-digit Period Clock that counts up or down, a time-of-day mode and practice segment timer capability. It is a 9 ft. x 5 ft. cabinet weighing 150 lbs. and drawing 1.8 amps.

What does not differ is construction. The cabinets are aluminum indoors and out, and neither is sealed - both carry drainage holes so that water which gets inside can escape. Electro-Mech assigns no IP rating and no weatherproof rating to any cabinet. No temperature range is published either, which is worth stating plainly for a sport played in cold buildings.

So the outdoor decision is not about durability grades. It is about digit heights, the clock behaviour and the mounting, and about the fact that an outdoor rink is a posts-and-concrete installation while an indoor rink is a wall or roof installation.

How the Scoreboard Hangs

Indoors, the cabinet ships with hardware for attaching it to a wall, and where it hangs instead, eye bolts along the top of the frame accept chain or cable. Whichever method, the structure has to carry the display plus anything hung with it, including ID panels. There are no posts and no concrete: those belong to outdoor installations, and a specification that describes footings for an indoor rink is describing the wrong product.

A four-sided assembly multiplies everything. Hung over centre ice it gives every seat a face to read, and a model designated -4 draws four times the power of the single-faced version and weighs more than four times as much. That load goes into the roof structure, so the people to involve early are the ones who know what the building can carry. It is also worth pricing the alternative first: where one face cannot be seen from every seat, an additional display driven from the same console is frequently lighter, simpler and enough.

Outdoors the method is the familiar one: holes dug, posts set plumb in temporary framing, concrete footings sized against the surface area of the sign and the local wind load requirement, a cure period, then the cabinets clamped to the posts - two clamps per post - and a hoist for the lift. A building permit depends entirely on the jurisdiction, and where one is required the code may also call for a locally licensed Professional Engineer to review the structure and stamp the drawings, which happens on fewer than one hundred Electro-Mech projects a year.

Choosing the Face: Four Indoor Cabinets

All four indoor models use 12 in. and 9 in. digits and run on 120 VAC, so the choice between them is about how much of the game reaches the wall.

The step that costs is Penalty Times and Shots on Goal. Going from a 9 ft. cabinet to the 12 ft. LX8850 is what puts running penalty time, with the player number beside it, in front of the benches and the crowd. On the indoor models the Penalty Timer digits are 9 inches tall.

The smallest model is the flexible one. Electro-Mech promotes the LX8350 as a hockey scoreboard and says plainly that it is just as comfortable scoring basketball or volleyball - anything needing Points for two teams and a clock. In a multi-purpose building that flexibility is the point; in a dedicated rink the larger cabinets are what you are actually buying.

The Console, and What It Runs

The console ships with the scoreboard and is already matched to it: the full-featured 37-key MP-Series or the simplified 15-key MM-Series, both configured for the sport with no codes to enter. An MM-Series can be upgraded to an MP-Series; the reverse is not possible.

What the console does behind a hockey scoreboard is more specific than most buyers expect. It holds four penalties per team, but only the top two run - their times count down with the Game Clock while the third and fourth wait, and when the shortest active penalty expires the ones below pop up to fill the slot. Every penalty is attached to a player number, which cannot be zero, and a 90-second penalty is entered as one minute thirty. Penalty sorting by time, and the choice between running Penalty Timers and simple Penalty Counts, are jumper settings inside the console - decide them at commissioning rather than mid-season.

The horn sounds automatically for about two seconds when the Game Clock reaches 0:00 at the end of a period, unless that behaviour is turned off. A Time Out Timer counts any duration under ten minutes without disturbing the Game Clock, and a Time of Day mode gives the building a clock between games.

The console reaches the scoreboard either over ScoreLink - the wireless option available on all models, with a working range of about 750 feet - or over a shielded two-conductor cable with a drain line, purchased separately, with runs supported to 1,000 feet. Roughly four out of five orders now go wireless. Control cable and power never share a conduit.

Power in a Rink

Every hockey scoreboard in the line runs on ordinary 120 VAC service, drawing 1.0 to 2.7 amps indoors and 1.8 outdoors. The control console needs its own circuit at 0.5 amps, and Electro-Mech recommends a dedicated breaker for the display. Electronic team names very nearly double the draw of the model they are added to.

The one case where the electrical planning stops being trivial is the four-sided assembly, which multiplies the scoreboard's draw by four. Everything else in a rink installation is a standard circuit and a run of low-voltage data cable, or no data cable at all if the link is wireless.

What the Record Shows About Who Buys These

Electro-Mech's sales and shipping record holds 276 entries carrying hockey models - counted one per organization, model and city - from 261 organizations across 45 states, shipped between 1999 and 2025. That is about ten a year, and the company says the same thing in its own words: it sells fewer than ten hockey scoreboards a year. These counts are model families rather than single part numbers: the record spells the same display both with and without the LX prefix, and both spellings are counted together here.

Read that table with one correction in mind: the most numerous entry is the model the company itself describes as equally suited to other sports, so an unknown share of those 103 orders was never bought for hockey. The scoreboards that can only be hockey scoreboards number in the dozens across 27 years.

The buyers are municipal and club rinks. Sorting the organization names, 105 of the 276 entries are ice venues by name - rinks, arenas, ice centres, skating clubs. Schools and colleges barely appear, and the company is direct about it: in twenty years exactly two hockey scoreboards went to schools, in its own judgement not used for hockey, and none to a college.

The geography is northern, which is the one place this record breaks the company's usual pattern: Pennsylvania 37, New Jersey 30, New York 18, Massachusetts 16, Florida 15, Connecticut 14. For every other sport the list opens with Georgia.

One caution about reading it too literally. These are sales and shipping records: they say what was ordered and where it was sent, not what is hanging today, and a shipping address is sometimes a dealer rather than the rink.

ID Panels, Locker Room Clocks and Extra Displays

• ID panels. Panels carrying a rink name, a club crest or a sponsor's message, hung with the scoreboard. They are the standard way a purchase gets offset. A model with a built-in identification panel on the left, right or both is designated -L, -R or -LR and is quoted as its own model, because it adds cabinet, weight and mounting hardware.
• Locker room clocks. The LX7406 is a 23 in. x 10 in. display weighing 12 lbs. with 6 in. digits, drawing 0.3 amps. It repeats the signal sent to the scoreboard Period Clock wherever you mount it indoors, and several can be daisy-chained back to one console. There are 139 in the sales record - in a building where the ice turns over every hour, that is real work being done.
• Auxiliary displays. Driven from the same console, and often the answer where one face cannot be seen from every seat.
• The horn. Built into the larger cabinets rather than bought separately. Worth confirming on the quote.

What Electro-Mech Does Not Offer

• A power play indicator. Not on any model. What the scoreboards show is Penalty Times for individual players, which is a different thing.
• An overtime period on the Period figure. It counts to four.
• IP or weatherproof ratings. None assigned, indoors or out.
• Temperature ratings. No published operating range, in either direction.
• 100,000-hour LED modules. Electro-Mech does not make LED modules and makes no lifetime claim about any component or assembly other than individual LEDs, where the statement is that the majority will keep working while holding at least half their original brightness over that span.
• Construction grades. No arena-grade, facility-grade or broadcast-grade tier exists. The cabinets are aluminum across the line.
• A control system called ScoreLink. ScoreLink is the wireless communication path between console and scoreboard. The controllers are the MP and MM consoles.

The durability claim the company does make is narrow, and it has two halves: an expected life of 15 years outdoors and 20 years indoors. For a line that sells both, the indoor figure is the one most rinks are buying against.

The Words That Belong on a Hockey Specification

Specifications go wrong on vocabulary more often than on numbers, because a quote, a manual and a scorer's table that use three different words for the same figure produce arguments that have nothing to do with equipment. The names this manufacturer uses:

• Penalty Timers The running times, each with its Player number beside it.
• Shots On Goal The per-team count, on the models whose face carries the digits.
• Game Clock and Period The two figures the whole building watches. The Period counts to four.
• Points What the scoreboard calls the score.
• GUEST and HOME The two sides of the scoreboard. The visiting side is captioned GUEST; it is not labelled Away, so a specification asking for that caption is asking for something the factory does not make.
• MP and MM consoles The controllers. The console runs the game; the scoreboard shows it.
• ScoreLink The wireless communication path between the two, an option on every model with a range of about 750 feet.

One more distinction worth holding onto when comparing documents: a Penalty Timer is a function a model either has or does not have. There are no types or grades of Penalty Timer to choose between - only cabinets that carry them and cabinets that do not.

A Buying Sequence That Avoids the Common Mistakes

Rinks that end up unhappy usually made the decisions in the wrong order. This is the order that works, and each step has one output.

• 1. Establish what the building can hang. Ask the facilities team what is behind the wall at the height you have in mind, or what the roof can carry if a centre-hung assembly is being considered. Output: flat-mounted or four-sided, and a weight limit.
• 2. Measure to the farthest seat. From where the scoreboard will hang, not from centre ice. Output: the digit height you need, which the indoor line covers at 12 in. and 9 in.
• 3. Decide the face. Points and Time, or Shots on Goal and Penalty Times for two players a side. Output: a 9 ft. cabinet or the 12 ft. one.
• 4. Decide indoor or outdoor. Usually obvious, but it changes the model and the mounting entirely. Output: the indoor line or the LX7860.
• 5. Decide the control path. Wireless at about 750 feet, or cable to 1,000. Output: whether anything has to be run through the building.
• 6. Then ask for a quote. With those five answers, a sales representative can spec it in one conversation rather than three.

The mistake this sequence prevents is the expensive one: choosing a cabinet because it has the features a league wants, and then discovering that the wall behind it, or the roof above it, cannot take the load. A scoreboard that has to be re-specified after a structural review costs a season, not money.

A last note on sequencing that saves money rather than spending it: if your building already has an Electro-Mech scoreboard and the complaint is one missing figure - penalty time kept on paper, or a second sheet with no clock - that is an addition rather than a replacement. An auxiliary display or a locker room clock driven from the same console is a far smaller order than a new scoreboard, and it is frequently the honest answer. Ask which of the two you are actually solving before the specification starts growing.

Commissioning the Scoreboard

Before the first game, run a full test from the console with the installer still on site:

• Every digit. Points for both sides, the Game Clock, the Period figure, Shots on Goal and each Penalty Timer position - two per team on the models that carry them.
• A penalty from start to expiry. Enter one short penalty and watch it run out, so the queue behaviour is familiar before it matters. Enter a second and a third to see the ones below pop up.
• The horn. Automatic at the end of a period by default, for about two seconds, and available manually at any time.
• The brightness. Fifty selectable levels from the console. A rink is a darker building than a gym, so the level that looks right with the house lights up is usually too bright for a game.
• The clock direction. On the outdoor model it counts up or down. Confirm it is set the way your leagues expect.
• The wireless link from the timekeeper's bench. Not from the middle of the ice - from the position that will be used on a game night.

Two more, unglamorous but worth the minute: note any shipping damage on the delivery receipt before signing it, and keep the scoreboard somewhere clean, dry and secure if it arrives before the building is ready for it.

What to Bring to a Quote

• Indoor or outdoor. Different products with different digit heights and different mounting.
• Where it will hang, and what is behind or above it. Wall structure or roof structure. This is the answer that decides whether a four-sided assembly is even possible.
• One face or four. Four faces mean four times the power and more than four times the weight.
• Which figures the face must show. Points and Time, or Shots on Goal and Penalty Times for two players a side.
• Wireless or cable. And if cable, the run from the timekeeper's bench to the scoreboard.
• Whether the building hosts other sports. If it does, the simplest cabinet in the line may be the right one - it is sold for basketball and volleyball as readily as for hockey.

Hockey is a small, specific line, and the honest version of the buying conversation reflects that. Establish what the building can hang, measure to the farthest seat, decide whether Penalty Times and Shots on Goal belong on the face, and let the model follow from those three answers.

Ready to work out which cabinet fits your rink? Request a quote from Electro-Mech and include whether it is indoor or outdoor, how it will hang, and what it needs to show.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between the indoor hockey models?

The LX8350 is a 9 ft. x 3 ft. cabinet at 90 lbs. showing Points, Time and Period. The LX8650 and LX8750 are 9 ft. x 5 ft. at 145 lbs. with the long-standing hockey layout. The LX8850 is 12 ft. x 5 ft. at 215 lbs. and adds Shots on Goal and two Penalty Times per team with player numbers. All four use 12 in. and 9 in. digits.

Is there an outdoor hockey scoreboard?

Yes, the LX7860: 9 ft. x 5 ft., 150 lbs., all digits 11 in., with a 4-digit Period Clock that counts up or down, a time-of-day mode and practice segment timer capability. It is a different product from the indoor models rather than a weather-rated version of one.

How does an indoor hockey scoreboard mount?

On wall hardware supplied with the cabinet, or hung from eye bolts along the top of the frame that accept chain or cable. The structure has to carry the display plus any ID panels hung with it. Posts and concrete footings belong to outdoor installations.

What does a four-sided scoreboard change?

Everything structural. A model designated -4 draws four times the power of the single-faced version and weighs more than four times as much, and that load goes into the roof. Where one face cannot be seen from every seat, an additional display on the same console is often the lighter answer.

Do these scoreboards have a power play indicator?

No. Electro-Mech hockey scoreboards do not offer one. They show Penalty Times for individual players on the models that carry Penalty Timers.

How many penalties can the console track?

Four per team, of which the top two run - their times count down with the Game Clock while the third and fourth wait and then pop up as slots free. Each penalty is attached to a player number that cannot be zero.

What electrical service does a hockey scoreboard need?

Ordinary 120 VAC. The line draws 1.0 to 2.7 amps indoors and 1.8 outdoors, the console needs its own circuit at 0.5 amps, and Electro-Mech recommends a dedicated breaker. A four-sided configuration multiplies the scoreboard's draw by four.

How far can the console be from the scoreboard?

About 750 feet with ScoreLink, the wireless option, and up to 1,000 feet with cable. ScoreLink is the communication path, not a control system - the controllers are the MP and MM consoles.

Do schools and colleges buy these?

Very rarely. In the sales record the buyers are municipal and club rinks, and the company states that in twenty years exactly two hockey scoreboards went to schools - in its own judgement not used for hockey - and none to a college.