On the way to the paved strip I had time to play with the cruise, it appears there is about a 5 mph hit in cruise: what RPM range would usually have me cruising at 95 mph ind. now I was showing 87 to 90. 5 to 7 mph, I can live with that....I briefly ran it up to a bit over 100 just to see how everything behaved, no problems with anything flapping in the breeze and the skis stayed at their ideal in flight AOA.
Landing on the tarmac was uneventful, with the skis well clear. At the lowest point (the ski tail) it's over an inch, and quickly gets higher, I'm really happy with that, ops at paved strips will be as usual with no compromises.
Then to find some snow: I flew to a residential airpark with a grass strip, they only had a short patch of snow left, but being level ground I figured this was a good first place to try. This landing was also uneventful, and when the snow ran out and I skied onto the grass the tail showed no inclination to come up, it just stopped faster. Flipping the switch to raise the skis I kicked it around in the usual tail dragger fashion and took off to find some real snow.
Back in my "neighborhood" I headed toward the highest clear ground I could find, one of the farm fields I play in during the fall, after the crops are down. This was sloped about 15 degrees, and the usual uphill landing techniques were used, the first few times I landed short and then kept the taxi speed up until to the top and then with the tail raised made the 180 to blast off down hill. Acceleration was very brisk, similar to wheels. I made another 15 or 20 hillside landings, and everything works PERFECT. Back at my place a mile away, I landed with the wheels as I had more dirt then snow. I will need to add to my already extensive pre landing check list ( 1. reduce throttle 2. pull flaps: no carb heat or mixture needed on the Rotax 912
) 3. raise and/or lower skis! In the short time remaining of good snow I will be making the most of it! I resolved the safety cable and electrical supply line securing by very loosely tie wrapping around the bungee, loose enough so it can do its bungee thing, and then tightly tie wrapping the cables to the first tie wrap. Simple and it works great.
