Emergency Ski Bottoms

4 posts in this topic

Posted

A little trick Leni taught me today.  Temps warmed up above freezing today with some rain to boot.  Jeff's skis are an old set of Federal 1500's; very small and all aluminum with no plastic bottoms.  I landed on Big Lake today to see how my Son-in-law was doing fishing.  It was about all I could do to keep it from nosing over and took full power to taxi as the skis cut trenches.  Once I stopped the bottoms of the skis were glued to the snow.  After much effort to pack a starting track and get the ski bottoms cleaned and sliding I was able to get it moving and taxied at full throttle until I got to an ice roade to take off.  At the Lodge it was the same thing again but this time we bagged the skis with garbage bags under them and taped on; it was an amazing difference, but only good for about one landing on a slushy gravel runway.  :)

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Posted

Hey Randy,

Good idea! Being from the South, I've never had that experience! But if I did, those skis would have been covered in the Handyman's Secret Weapon, Duck TapeðŸ‘! You might get more uses per application. Thank you Red Green for demonstrating the magic of Duck Tape! Bryce

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Posted

Ask Leni who tought him that.

I always carry a 20'X 16" roll of heavy visqueen just for that purpose.

Tape it ovet the nose of the ski an push it under and away you go.

And its good for more than several landings/take offs.

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Posted

 I remember my father talking about doing this. Years ago he had a Cessna 180. In the winter he was using wheel penetration skis (I don't remember the brand). I've never flown wheel penetration skis, but I understand them to be a compromise between utility and performance. Taking off from snow in lousy conditions he said he'd tape visqueen to the skis. While not performing exactly like a straight ski, it was a big difference. Once back in town, landing on pavement was a non-event as the pavement ate away the visqueen under the tires. Obviously a one-time use set-up, but it sounded like it could make the difference between a go and a no-go.

 

-Nate

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