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Early winter fun!

Veetail88

Veetail88

Well Known Member
Breakfast at Lone Rock Saturday morning then down to Ron Moring's place for a little airplane geek out session. (He's well along on a Glasair Sportsman project) Ron grabbed these pics as I departed in the snow. Amazing how a little snow in the grass shortens your landing roll out!

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Ron is ready for a bit more snow! He has some VERY nice facilities!

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Great photos! Call me paranoid... but I'd worry about ground roll thru snow with wheel pants. I know it's a thin dusting, and there's probably room inside the pants for significant accumulation... but my brain is prone to catastrophizing, so that's where it went.
 
snow

Martin, The snow layer was very thin. There is no frost in the ground and the snow was gone on the bottom. We put Jesse's plane inside to make sure it was thawed out before he left and there wasn't even a puddle under the wheels when he left. However if there would have been more snow I would have removed my wheel pants and not recommended landing with pants. I froze up last year in about 4 inches of snow. It wasn't as bad it seems you just stop in about 150 ft. (traction is not good) I taxied to the hangar with the wheels locked up. When I got the concrete apron they all broke loose, pushed plane inside, let thaw, and removed pants for rest of winter.
I departed that strip and flew to Lonerock with no problems so I was sure it would fine when we returned. You are correct, a bit more snow and it is time to remove. I used Skybolt fasteners on the wheel pants for quick removal.
 
868RM said:
Martin, The snow layer was very thin. There is no frost in the ground and the snow was gone on the bottom. We put Jesse's plane inside to make sure it was thawed out before he left and there wasn't even a puddle under the wheels when he left. However if there would have been more snow I would have removed my wheel pants and not recommended landing with pants. I froze up last year in about 4 inches of snow. It wasn't as bad it seems you just stop in about 150 ft. (traction is not good) I taxied to the hangar with the wheels locked up. When I got the concrete apron they all broke loose, pushed plane inside, let thaw, and removed pants for rest of winter.
I departed that strip and flew to Lonerock with no problems so I was sure it would fine when we returned. You are correct, a bit more snow and it is time to remove. I used Skybolt fasteners on the wheel pants for quick removal.
Click to expand...

Good points... I thought of nosing over, but not the greatly reduced friction coefficient. I should have known you thought it through very carefully. Must have been a great time! Someday...
 
Christmas and snow

I hope everyone has a safe and merry Christmas. Vlad, those few snow flakes we had on Saturday were gone by late Sat. night and it has been mid 40's since.
Would like some input from true north flyers. I have avoided any snow with a "crusted surface". Is it as bad as it would appear? Also have never landed on a frozen lake runway like Vlad stops at every year. I would think that it is a bit of task to keep the airplane going where you want to go at slower speeds.
P.S. Dan I might consume a Spotted Cow over the Christmas break just to let you "southern folks" know I'm thinking of you. Merry Christmas
 
I'm either lucky, foolish or it is not the issue one would think!
For 44 years, 18 airplanes and nearly 6000 hours I have never removed wheel pants because of snow or soft grass ops, and it does snow in Indiana.
 
Winter fun

I was riding in a friend's ?8 a few years ago when there was some light snow around. The snow packed the wheel pants to my surprise and produced a crack in one which required repair. The only hint in the plane was increased rolling resistance. I was too dumb to worry but my friend the pilot was concerned and checked right away. The snow was so compacted it was hard to dig out - no heated hanger.
 
For the record, after this departure I flew about 25 minutes back to East Troy and hangered the airplane. Temps were around 20F. The landing was normal (i.e. no sticking anything), but I did find a couple of snow chunks trying to escape between the fairing and the tire.

If the snow were slushy I think it could have caused a problem, but it wasn't and it didn't! Just a lot of fun.....:D
 
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