Ski rigging

[Bruce Fenstermacher]

John I had already thought of car dollies. Problem for me anyway is the snow is at least 500 ft from my hanger. i don't think the small wheels will cut it.

I'm thinking of taking a 2x12 and cut it just wider then the outer edge of one ski to the outer edge of the other ski. I'll then take some angle iron about 18 inches wide and attach it to the ends of the 2x 12 to attach lawn mower wheels to. Here is a sketch.


It will take 2 people to get the plane on and off the dolly but at my airport it's going to take 2 people to ski fly anyway.

[johneeb]

John I had already thought of car dollies. Problem for me anyway is the snow is at least 500 ft from my hanger. i don't think the small wheels will cut it.

I'm thinking of taking a 2x12 and cut it just wider then the outer edge of one ski to the outer edge of the other ski. I'll then take some angle iron about 18 inches wide and attach it to the ends of the 2x 12 to attach lawn mower wheels to. Here is a sketch.


It will take 2 people to get the plane on and off the dolly but at my airport it's going to take 2 people to ski fly anyway.

Your neighbor probably won't miss those Lawnmower wheels until spring.

You ought to be able to build a whole bunch of your design for the price of one Gojak.

If snows much more here in Chicago I may have to consider taking up Ski-flying.

Bruce I hope when you get it worked out you will publish some vidio for all of us here to link up to.

[jrenwick]

Hi Bruce,

As promised, here are some photos of the ski lift dollies I'm using. As I mentioned, you would have to add a through-bushing to the pedestals on your skis in order to use something like this. For everyone else: this sort of thing probably only works for a very light aircraft like a J3. Not for 170s. But then, this was an off-topic discussion from the start, wasn't it?






These were built by another TIC170A member: Dennis Hoffman of Stillwater, MN.

You move the lever forward to lift the ski, and backward to lower it. (This has to be done while lifting the ski tip up with your other hand.) Broken down, the pair of them will fit in my extended baggage compartment, but they don't leave a lot of room for baggage.

Saturday I was able to roll the Cub out of the hangar, start it up, taxi to the "snow runway," remove the dollies, take off, land, return to the taxiway, reinstall the dollies, and taxi back to the hangar, all without assistance. That was the first time on skis for me, so it was nice to be able to run through all that before the deep snow comes!

Best Regards,

John

[N3243A]

John,

The Photo links above don't work (at least for me). Could you try them again?

Bruce

[jrenwick]

The Photo links above don't work (at least for me). Could you try them again?

Is that better?

John

[Bruce Fenstermacher]

Very neat John.

A few questions. When the ski is lifted and the lever is forward it would be forcing the front of the ski down till it either hits the ground or the safety cable is stretched to the limit. I'm assuming the cable is to the limit and while taxiing the front of the ski doesn't hit the ground. Am I correct?

Second how long is your bungee cord. Mine is about 34" but my skis (SC-1) are shorter than yours I think so I don't have the cable at the end of the bungee.

[jrenwick]

Very neat John.

A few questions. When the ski is lifted and the lever is forward it would be forcing the front of the ski down till it either hits the ground or the safety cable is stretched to the limit. I'm assuming the cable is to the limit and while taxiing the front of the ski doesn't hit the ground. Am I correct?

Second how long is your bungee cord. Mine is about 34" but my skis (SC-1) are shorter than yours I think so I don't have the cable at the end of the bungee.

Hi Bruce,

You're right. The lever pushes the ski tips down until the safety cable is tight. I adjusted the lengths of the safety cables so they keep the skis just off the ground. If the safety cables are too long to keep the skis off the ground, I had thought of making a couple of shorter cables with hooks on the ends that I could stretch between the tips and the tabs on the airplane -- and install those just for taxiing on the dollies. But I didn't have to shorten my cables very much at all, so I just did that.

I don't know how long my bungees are, and I won't be able to measure them until some time next week. AeroSki in Brooten, MN might have all the data for your skis; I'd give them a call if you want to know how these things really should be rigged.

Happy skiing!

John

[Kyle Wolfe]

John, I'm envious. Sounds like you're having too much fun. And with 4-8 more inches coming this week, you should get plenty of ski time in. I may have to get the 170 out and fly up to see you sometime just so I can get a ski flight

John, you know many of these guys since they live here, including our C170 friend Neil Otey, but for all you other ski flyers, here's a pretty good websit that's dedicated to ski flying. http://www.treetopflyers.org/cgi-bin/YaBB/YaBB.cgi

[jrenwick]

Kyle,

Thanks for that link. I see Neil Otey quite a bit, because I share a big hangar at 21D with him and a few other guys. He's had his skis on for a month now. In fact, he's flying with my tail ski -- from the set I haven't put on my 170 yet. Must be nice to have 180HP and hydraulics!

John

[Bruce Fenstermacher]

Kyle I just found that sight the other night and read most of it.

John I plan on rigging my skis per the instructions in 43.13.

43.13 allows between 20 and 35 degrees angle of negative incidence. This seems to be a wide adjustment. I'd think -35 degrees would allow the ski toe to drag with your wheel setup and I'd also think it would be difficult to land with a broken bungee and the ski at that the -35 degree angle.