[quote="pburns"]1st year for me handpropping and I have tied the tail or received a prop every time other than when I couldn't turn around with skis on once. If I am stopping somewhere that no one is around I will make sure I park next to something I can tie to. I carry a length of static line with a carribiner on each end. Once it's in idle it won't move on grass and can be easily handled on pavement even though I sweat it out every time. My plane also came with these cool parking brakes although I haven't had to use them yet. They actually work. So far so good. The 65's start easy unless you flood the thing.

Pete[/quote

I had a wheeled T cart, and had a good time with it, always propping if myself, not having " help." Now, with my S-7's tail release when on skis, I am very grateful for both the starter and the release, life is good! You have my full respect! Hand propping on skis, especially on some of the slopes I land on,, could be more fun then I need.

brown bear wrote:You have my full respect! Hand propping on skis, especially on some of the slopes I land on,, could be more fun then I need.

I was honestly scared shitless. All i could see was getting chopped into little pieces and or seeing my plane take off without me. I was alone had landed and F'ed my turn around up and couldn't get past a tree overhanging in front of me. I turned the plane off and moved it by hand. I dug a little hole for the tailwheel hoping it wasn't too deep to taxi out of and stuffed a small pile of snow in front of each ski, put it in idle and it popped right off and stayed put, all good. Once I hopped in I noticed I left my SPOT on the dash. In retrospect I should have taken it out with me. Learned a couple lessons that day. I would rather get dropped at the top of a class V rapid with no paddle than do that again.

Pete

I have found that after priming and pulling the prop through a few times, then I will prime a couple shots again and out my mixture to the cutoff position. This allows the engine to fire and idle for enough time that I can reach in and slowly advance the mixture to keep it running. It wont run very long with the mixture at cutoff, so if it does runaway it wont go far.

Thank you all for the overwhelming amount of support with this! I was able to fly the plane for the first time yesterday and even got to hand prop it myself. I am moving forward with purchasing this aircraft, I think it'll be a great starter plane and an even better learning experience. I'm searching for a good CFI out of Anchorage with hand propping experience, so if anyone has any contacts please let me know.

Some key takeaways for me based off of the thread responses:
- When in doubt, tie the tailwheel up.
- If you can't tie the tailwheel, then prime the engine and then shut the fuel off before starting so she can only get so far if something were to go wrong.
- Buy a set of wheel chocks and attach a rope so that you can pull them out once in the cabin.
- Don't bounce against the compression.
- Huge liability to allow other's to hand prop the plane.

I'm sure I will have many further questions to come with this purchase. It's refreshing to know that there is such a knowledgeable and friendly community out there to answer questions like these.

Thanks BackcountryPilot folks!

- Logan