http://www.avweb.com/news/columns/182671-1.html
Rick Durden has been having an annual ski-plane gathering for about 10 years now, and I was lucky enough to be invited this year. Rick also was kind enough to let me invite my CFII along for the trip, which allowed me to get some good instrument work in on the way there and back and also gave my CFII a chance to do some ski-flying. We flew the 182 up to KCAD, where Northwoods Aviation has a Cub and a Super Cub on skis for rent at very reasonable prices ($90/hr for dual). I arrived on Saturday just in time to see the Super Cub take off from a flat snowy area next to the approach end of runway 25. I went inside to meet everybody and found that this is exactly the type of place you'd expect to be called "Northwoods Aviation," a great place for Hangar Talk:
Northwoods is a father-son operation. They have several J-3 and PA-18 Cubs, a 170, a 180, and there are lots of other neat airplanes parked in the hangar next door where I kept the 182. Ercoupe, amphibious Maule, Tri-Pacer, Viking, and two of these (I forgot what they are... Had to ask!) For the most part, all of the planes were in amazingly good condition as well, some impressive specimens:
The Super Cub was being kept busy, and Derek, the son part of the operation who is a CFI and A&P, asked if I'd like to go flying in the Cub. After one-third of a nanosecond, I enthusiastically said yes and we pulled it out of the hangar. The Cub was on "wheel penetration" skis, which retract with a manual hydraulic pump to let the wheels down far enough to land on a runway or to be easily rolled out of the hangar.
The next trick was getting in. You can't step on the gear strut or the wing strut, and at 6'4" these planes are just a bit small for me! Regardless of your height, about the only way to get in is to sit on the bottom of the door frame and grab one of the tubes in the cockpit and slide yourself into the seat.
After getting in, I took a look around the cockpit to get familiar with it. There's not much to this process! The panel has only an airspeed indicator, non-sensitive altimeter, magnetic compass, tachometer, and oil temp and pressure gauges, and an inclinometer which didn't appear to work very well. There are no switches because there's no electrical system. The only other things on the panel itself are the primer, mixture control, and a cabin heat knob. There was a carb heat control on one wall, the mag switch on the left wing root, and clear tube fuel gauges on both wing roots. The throttle is at the bottom of the left window.
Another first for me: Hand-propping. Well, I didn't do it, but I'd never actually flown a plane that needed it. Derek was a pro at it though - He pulled the prop through a couple of times, set the throttle, had me turn on the mags and pull the primer out, and with a swift motion of his arm the engine fired right up. He slid into the seat behind me, I pumped the skis down, and I taxied out onto the snow-covered field.
One oddity on skis is that you have no brakes, so your runup must be done in motion. You also use soft-field technique as it's quite difficult to get the plane moving again if it's stopped in snow. So, I did a quick mag check at about 1500 RPM while taxiing downwind, we did a quick takeoff briefing on the roll (on the slide?) and I turned into the wind and added power.
The takeoff is pretty easy - After adding power, push forward to get the tail off the ground, then a couple of seconds later pull back to take off. I never thought a 90hp engine could lift me off the ground, but it worked! The climb rate was rather anemic but it didn't matter - I was flying the venerable J-3 Cub!
We headed straight out toward a large lake, Lake Mitchell. Low and slow indeed, only 4-500 AGL and then back down a little to check out the lake from the air. We picked a landing spot clear of any slush or other signs of moisture and without any drifts across the path and then flew a pattern around it for a touch-and-go. The first landing on any ice-covered lake is a touch and go in case of thin ice. After takeoff, we flew a pattern again, looking at the tracks on downwind to make sure they didn't darken up from water coming through cracks in the ice. They looked good, so we aimed for the same spot and landed. (Watered? Snowed? haha)
We did a third landing toward the other end of Lake Mitchell and after takeoff saw some snowmobiles racing downwind. We smoked 'em. :D (Yes, we kept our 500 foot separation.) It was kind of a reminder that low and slow still isn't THAT slow. We headed towards Pleasant Lake, just a mile or two north, for a couple more touch and goes. Pleasant Lake is much smaller, and with the slow climb rate of the Cub we had to make the "go" fairly quick and follow low terrain to stay safe. Finally, we headed back to KCAD.
Derek saw my CFII out on the ramp with my camera, so we did a low pass over runway 18-36 before making a left-hand pattern to the landing area. We landed and called it a day. We headed to McGuire's Resort to join everyone else for an excellent dinner buffet (prime rib and crab legs anyone?) and a gathering in Rick's room afterwards. It was great to meet a bunch of pilots and listen to their stories.
Sunday morning, we had an excellent breakfast and headed back over to the airport. Conditions were MVFR with lake effect snow, but when low and slow that's not such a big deal, especially when you're never more than about 5 miles from the field. It also cleared up throughout the day.
Around lunchtime, I still hadn't flown again and others were making plans for lunch. I still wanted to fly the Super Cub, and it seemed like this would be my last chance. Derek said we could go flying and he'd drop me off at the restaurant where everyone else was going when we were done.
We hopped into the Super Cub, which was equipped with wheel replacement skis - They mount right onto the axles where the wheels would be if they were still there. The Super Cub has several things the Cub doesn't: An electrical system (and starter), wing flaps, 150hp engine, sensitive altimeter, slightly wider cabin, and probably a couple of other things I'm forgetting. Unfortunately, the wing flap lever was all the way up next to my leg when I put in full flaps and that seemed to prevent any significant leftward movement of the stick, so I stuck to two notches of flaps for the landings.
Again, we taxied out and took off from the same area. With the extra ponies up front, the Super Cub really jumps off the ground! Normally when I think of a 150-hp airplane, I think "Warrior that hasn't been upgraded" and I certainly don't think about good performance. However, the Super Cub climbed briskly in the cold air. We headed a couple miles south to Lake Cadillac. After a couple of landings there, I had Derek take the controls while I took some pictures.
We did a couple of landings on Lake Mitchell as well, and I tried to get a photo of our tracks.
Finally, we landed on Lake Mitchell near the restaurant where the others were. I'd thought Derek was going to drive me there, but I ended up getting the coolest $100 hamburger ever instead!
Watching the Super Cub take off was amazing - Derek got it moving, taxied it further out onto the lake, and added power. It only took about 50 feet for the plane to lift off! I started heading for the restaurant, but I wish I'd had my camera out instead, as Derek came back for a nice low pass before swooping back up into the air - Would have made a great picture, but I couldn't get my camera turned on fast enough!
As if all the Cub flying wasn't enough, I got 8.4 hours of good IFR time in the 182 on the way there and back. My CFII used all five of his instrument covers and two post-it notes in the process! :hairraisi However, I still managed to hold altitude and course well within parameters. His last trick was to fail Nav1 on me on the ILS 21 back into MSN just shy of the FAF, requiring a very quick re-tune/identify on Nav2 to track the localizer instead. The checkride should be very soon, hopefully in March.
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