With both apologies to Crzyivan13 for the catchy title, and thanks for the extra incentive to reach another dimension of backcountry flying.

Was out doing sandbars today, found a long shallow pool and waterskiied the tires for the first time, then a few sandbars later noticed mud on the tires and waterskiied some more to wipe 'em clean before going back to the hangar.

Thanks also to A1Skinner for his early encouragement, and to BVT that demonstrated waterskiing to me in his Rans S-7.

Haha! Nice! Congrats on your first time. You'll never forget it. [emoji6]

Congrats!

I have tailwheel envy

Jeredp wrote:I have tailwheel envy

I've been an unknowing passenger in a 182 when the pilot waterskied the nosewheel

What's the general technique or guidelines to this? I assume keep it in the white arch with some flaps, and slowly kiss the water?

How do I hydroplaning?

CamTom12 wrote:How do I hydroplaning?

Haha. Didn't try it out on the way home from Alaska? Had lots of time!

Don't use the brakes. Ease it down slowly. Be careful of glassy water. You can always pull back and be off of it pretty quick

Tom wrote:Don't use the brakes. Ease it down slowly. Be careful of glassy water. You can always pull back and be off of it pretty quick

This X2. In my experience the water wants to push you back off until you get pretty slow. So you have to keep slight forward pressure on the stick to keep it on.

Closest to a definitive thread is https://www.backcountrypilot.org/forum/how-do-i-hydroplaning-the-wheels-2107, search for "hydroplaning" instead of "waterski" (though to me the first happens on a water covered runway and you get into square roots of tire pressure and the second is the fun stuff we do).

Perhaps admin can put all the info together into an FAQ, liability concerns considered. Seems to be two camps, the "you'll burn in hell and raise our insurance premiums if you ever even try it" and "just another level/evolution of backcountry flying that needs the right equipment, conditions, technique and skill".

I watched them do water ski landings with trikes on a couple of those Flying Wild Alaska episodes. I think I would have to move more north so my KAHONIES grow much larger before I do that with the 172. However you never know what might happen on the shores of Lake Labarge during the midnight sun.

I use my brakes. I have 31 ABW's and they will sometimes get a harmonic buzz going if they are rolling through a rippled surface. If I'm just touching down short of the beach then of course I stay off the brakes, but for a prolonged ski, especially with a ripple on the water, I stop the tires. Much smoother and my thinking is they would hydroplane at a lower speed when stopped as opposed to rolling. Not that I have come anywhere near testing the limits of that, but imagine a barefoot skier who starts "running" as fast as he can. He's going to fall through.

Very cool. More power to you!

I myself have nowhere near the set of specific water-balls required to try this out. I have taken a few measured risks in an aircraft, but hydroplaning the wheels - I just feel like I'll goof it, and the whole plane will be a write off....

I regularly see opportunities to use the technique to shorten landings, I just don't think this is something I want to teach myself!