On New Years Eve we had a really beautiful day here, sunny and clear. I took my Dad and cousin and flew from Pitt Meadows ( where it was well above freezing) up Indian Arm, over the pass to Squamish, up the valley past Whistler and Pemberton, over the Hurley road and on to Gun Lake to visit my Aunt and Uncle over lunch. Gun Lake is in the South Chilcotion Mountains. It's been a mild winter so far and Gun Lake is deep so the lake is not frozen. Landed on the lake and went in for lunch and a visit and when I came out I realized just how cold things were, my rope at the dock was frozen solid, you could hold it straight out like a stick. The water rudders were also frozen. I freed them up but I did realize they'd likely refreeze in flight, I didn't see any solution to that though other than waiting until spring to go home. So I took off and sure enough the water rudders did refreeze, what I hadn't counted on though was how this was going to affect the main rudder, I had held some right rudder on during climb out and now with the water rudders linked to the main it was frozen with right rudder in, I had to hold in left rudder all the way home. I did think about landing sooner and trying to remedy the situation but that still meant landing with the rudder frozen and stiff, and with temperatures what they were the nearest place I could solve this was basically all the way home anyway. I landed on the Fraser at home and made sure to give the tails of the float a good dip at the end of the landing run and the rudder did immediately free up, so I didn't have to kill the motor and jump out onto the floats to fix things. I think I'll try to avoid this scenario in the future but I'm wondering if any veteran float flyers here know any ways to counteract the freezing of the water rudders? If I kept the rudders working back and forth during climb out? Kept raising and lowering them for a bit?

There's no magic fix for the problem. You like some of the the rest of us learned enough to wonder how to deal with it and minimize the problem next time. Avoidance is an option but why not go beyond that step? There's lots of info on flying floats in below freezings temps if you search and as have you have done, ask. Some get an answer or options and are never heard from again. It can be discussed if you're willing to have a dialog.

Question: What were the air temps when you were flying or parked? Was that a clue? It's not been discussed so far.

Gary

I am sure someone will bring up the fact that rudder cable routing will vary from float to float, that can have some baring on the freezing problem. I don't have a solution, but understand your concerns, I can verify landing, then discovering you have no water rudders is a helpless feeling. Getting out on the floats in the middle of a lake, cold water, possibly windy, trying to balance yourself and free the cables at the same time is not a great experience. I carried de-icer for a while, but in the end the answer for me is to just leave the plane at home if having the water rudders freeze up is a concern. The risk of falling off a float in those conditions, or possibly banging up the plane trying to power boat it in to a tight area is not worth it for what in reality is probably a non-essential flight, that is my opinion, others will vary.

Steve

There are a couple things you can try, but they have to be done BEFORE you’re in cruise.

One is, as you noted, cycle the water rudders up and down immediately after takeoff. That MAY work, but as noted above, depending on the installation, things may still freeze up.

Another approach is to simply take off with water rudders down, and leave them down. Problem there is water rudders are often rigged to compensate for float rigging, and when down in flight, they may induce unwanted yaw. Landing with rudders down once won’t hurt anything and the jarring on arrival MAY knock loose any ice. In any case, once on the water, you can push hard on the pedals, which will probably break loose any frozen cables. While cables may freeze, some force applied will generally cause them to slide through ice.

This solves the bigger issue, which is, with the rudders up, after landing there’s no way short of slithering (literally) back there to try to give one a kick to get it to extend. Best case, that gives you one water rudder, and very likely a polar plunge as well.

Don’t ask how I discovered that. Float decks in freezing conditions can be treacherous.

And, of course, by far the best program is to avoid this scenario in the first place, but sometimes it can sneak up on you.

MTV

Fraser Farmer, are you on straight floats?
Do you keep your airplane at Pitt Meadows?
I've been there (once) and know that the Fraser runs right alongside, and is used for seaplane ops, but don't know about access.
I assume there's a ramp, and maybe you have an alligator or trailer to tow the airplane to somewhere on the airport.
I've seen some imaginative home-built floatplane trailers at the Renton airport on Lake Washington near Seattle.

PA1195 wrote:There's no magic fix for the problem. You like some of the the rest of us learned enough to wonder how to deal with it and minimize the problem next time. Avoidance is an option but why not go beyond that step? There's lots of info on flying floats in below freezings temps if you search and as have you have done, ask. Some get an answer or options and are never heard from again. It can be discussed if you're willing to have a dialog.

Question: What were the air temps when you were flying or parked? Was that a clue? It's not been discussed so far.

Gary

Temperature is a good question and one I wish I knew. Cold enough to freeze my rope at the dock stiff like a fire poker and warm enough that you don't need gloves or a hat. I took off expecting the water rudders to freeze but I didn't see any way around that. What I didn't expect was them freezing and holding the air rudder to the right from climb out.

steve wrote:I am sure someone will bring up the fact that rudder cable routing will vary from float to float, that can have some baring on the freezing problem. I don't have a solution, but understand your concerns, I can verify landing, then discovering you have no water rudders is a helpless feeling. Getting out on the floats in the middle of a lake, cold water, possibly windy, trying to balance yourself and free the cables at the same time is not a great experience. I carried de-icer for a while, but in the end the answer for me is to just leave the plane at home if having the water rudders freeze up is a concern. The risk of falling off a float in those conditions, or possibly banging up the plane trying to power boat it in to a tight area is not worth it for what in reality is probably a non-essential flight, that is my opinion, others will vary.

Steve

The routing on mine goes down the rear legs then along the top of the floats back to the rudders. If I had to guess I'd think the cables froze in the sleeve/guides near the tails but I thawed it all out on landing by dipping the tails so I didn't really get to investigate.
I'd also lean toward avoidance but I'd like to think about this a bit in case it sneaks up on me again in the future.

mtv wrote:There are a couple things you can try, but they have to be done BEFORE you’re in cruise.

One is, as you noted, cycle the water rudders up and down immediately after takeoff. That MAY work, but as noted above, depending on the installation, things may still freeze up.

Another approach is to simply take off with water rudders down, and leave them down. Problem there is water rudders are often rigged to compensate for float rigging, and when down in flight, they may induce unwanted yaw. Landing with rudders down once won’t hurt anything and the jarring on arrival MAY knock loose any ice. In any case, once on the water, you can push hard on the pedals, which will probably break loose any frozen cables. While cables may freeze, some force applied will generally cause them to slide through ice.

This solves the bigger issue, which is, with the rudders up, after landing there’s no way short of slithering (literally) back there to try to give one a kick to get it to extend. Best case, that gives you one water rudder, and very likely a polar plunge as well.

Don’t ask how I discovered that. Float decks in freezing conditions can be treacherous.

And, of course, by far the best program is to avoid this scenario in the first place, but sometimes it can sneak up on you.

MTV

I'd imagine that slipping off an ice covered float is not much fun and I'll try to keep that as just imagination and not experience.
I think the more annoying part of it all was the effect the freezing water rudders had on the air rudder, freezing it with right rudder in from climb out and making it stiff all the way home. I realized the water rudders were frozen up and was prepared for that, home airport has lots of room on the water so if dipping the tails hadn't worked I was ready to kill the engine and carefully climb out and free them up, there's plenty of space to take your time and deal with them.
I think the freezing happened at the sleeves/cable guides near the tail. That's just a guess though as it all came loose when I dipped the tails. One thought I'd had is to have a squeeze tube of grease on hand and if I was concerned about this problem work some grease into likely freezing points. I think in these kind of temps that grease would be sticky enough that it might last through a take off run. That is if I haven't avoided the situation entirely. I wonder if silicone into the sleeves might have the same effect, it's come apart with the cables working back and forth but it might prevent freezing in those sleeves?

hotrod180 wrote:Fraser Farmer, are you on straight floats?
Do you keep your airplane at Pitt Meadows?
I've been there (once) and know that the Fraser runs right alongside, and is used for seaplane ops, but don't know about access.
I assume there's a ramp, and maybe you have an alligator or trailer to tow the airplane to somewhere on the airport.
I've seen some imaginative home-built floatplane trailers at the Renton airport on Lake Washington near Seattle.

Yep, straight floats and the plane is at Pitt Meadows for now. They have a big ramp into the river and I have a parking spot right next to the ramp. I have a home built hydraulic trailer that hooks behind my pickup.

Sounds like you already have it figured out. Not uncommon on the coast with an arctic outflow, I’ve had elevator/rudder trims freeze up as well. Usually a bath in warmer water or even flying a couple feet over the ocean for a while was enough to thaw them. Gun Lake, you don’t have a lot of options except to get out and let the ball sit in the corner until you get home.

Good discussion and interesting experiences. Mine were with EDO 2000's on a Citabria, PA-18, and PA-12, EDO 4930's on a Beaver, and EDO 3430's on a C-185. All in fresh water which might make a difference right near freezing.

Any air temps above the water that are below freezing and ice might form on the exposed float parts, prop, or belly/tail when splashed during taxi. Usually the floats and cables stayed ice free until airborne. I tried working the rudders up-down-sideways but a few times they simply stuck in one spot like folks have noted here. What ever springs were involved then stretched to allow some air rudder movement. I finally just left the water rudders down and flew as straight as I could until they froze. On landing they would usually thaw if sunk into warmer water.

Lakes if not too wavy can be ok but rivers can be a problem as steering is soon needed. I would try to land into the current and taxi more than usual before settling into the river hoping they would thaw. If there were any ice floes or frazil ice floating on the river's surface or near shore steering was a concern. More than once I aborted the landing to avoid problems. I told myself beforehand if things weren't ok then forget it while still pointed in a safe direction with some speed and air rudder control available.

I think it helps to apply marine grade grease (spray or solid), or treat with Par-al-ketone, the cables, water rudder mounts, and bushings to exclude water. Steering cables will usually slip over frozen pulleys but a rudder retract cable may not extend as the rudder pull down springs may be frozen or too weak to extend them until it all thaws.

I flew down to +15F on floats but any colder and ice covered everything. Good experience for the young and adventurous. Today it's not worth the time.

Gary

Karmutzen wrote:Sounds like you already have it figured out. Not uncommon on the coast with an arctic outflow, I’ve had elevator/rudder trims freeze up as well. Usually a bath in warmer water or even flying a couple feet over the ocean for a while was enough to thaw them. Gun Lake, you don’t have a lot of options except to get out and let the ball sit in the corner until you get home.

So do the guys flying the BC coast in winter just accept this as a fact of life and run with it?
I'll say that while I'd like to avoid this it wasn't the end of the world and it was in fact still a great flight. I probably wouldn't do it deliberately though. Lots of accidents happen when a few contributing factors stack up and it feels a bit like flying home this way was flying with one contributing factor in the stack.

When I worked in Kodiak, our Beaver lived on amphibious floats all year. We did salt water a lot, and, when temps were warm enough, fresh water. Any time I landed in salt, I TRIED to get the plane in fresh water to at least partially wash it off. The airplane parked outside on wheels at home.

Sometimes, I’d do so when it was a wee bit too cold, and run into the scenario you described. That was when I began just leaving the water rudders down when departing the fresh water. At least that way, you have some leverage on the system to break it loose. As others noted, your down springs on water rudders generally aren’t stout enough to break loose frozen cables/pulleys.

Anyway, there are a few traps to get into operating a seaplane in cold temps. Better to avoid them if possible, but not a huge deal in most cases.

Check your walk wires, though. I landed and taxied up to a dock one winter, and opted to use the walk wire to cross from left to right. Walk wire turned loose halfway across, and I went swimming. Fortunately, there was a warm lodge, complete with dry clothes and coffee just up the boardwalk........but still.

MTV

Very interesting post.

My cabin is just east of Gun Lake, on Seton Lake and I was planning on flying in all winter. I started a thread a while back about floats in cold weather and Gary and Mike scared me enough that I'm using either chains or a sled to get into the cabin.

I wasn't scared about the water rudders freezing so much as control surfaces that may get splashed and frozen in place. Of course, water rudders that won't go down are one thing, but water rudders that freeze your rudder in place are quite another. I assume it would be a fairly thin coat of ice that would need to be broken but temps have to rise a lot before they would melt of their own accord.

Glad it worked as well as it did. It was a beauty day for flying.

albravo wrote:Very interesting post.

My cabin is just east of Gun Lake, on Seton Lake and I was planning on flying in all winter. I started a thread a while back about floats in cold weather and Gary and Mike scared me enough that I'm using either chains or a sled to get into the cabin.

I wasn't scared about the water rudders freezing so much as control surfaces that may get splashed and frozen in place. Of course, water rudders that won't go down are one thing, but water rudders that freeze your rudder in place are quite another. I assume it would be a fairly thin coat of ice that would need to be broken but temps have to rise a lot before they would melt of their own accord.

Glad it worked as well as it did. It was a beauty day for flying.

I didn't realize that Seton doesn't freeze solid. Gun Lake does, it just hasn't yet this year. Seton is a very deep lake though and I guess it goes up and down a bit and has a fair bit of flow.
Like I said, probably wouldn't do this again deliberately but you do still have movement in the air rudder, you're just fighting the springs.
We ought to go flying one of these days.

The physics associated with deep lakes freezing is pretty cool...pun intended.

As the surface of the lake cools, that water settles, to be replaced by warmer (relatively) water from below.

In a shallow lake, it doesn’t take long for the lake to “turn over” to the point where the surface is cool enough to actually freeze. Once that surface freezes, ice builds fairly fast, regardless of lake depth, as long as air temps stay cold.

But deep lakes have a huge mass of water, and it takes a long time of cold weather to turn over and freeze.

This is mostly a coastal phenom, because temps aren’t so severe as interior.

In Kodiak, we had a camp on an island in Karluk Lake, which is ~ 90 meters deep in places. Even in winters where the lake did freeze over, it took till middle January sometimes, and a few weeks later it would break up.....sometimes.

Of the 8 winters I lived there, Karluk only froze over three or four.

MTV

mtv wrote:The physics associated with deep lakes freezing is pretty cool...pun intended.

As the surface of the lake cools, that water settles, to be replaced by warmer (relatively) water from below.

In a shallow lake, it doesn’t take long for the lake to “turn over” to the point where the surface is cool enough to actually freeze. Once that surface freezes, ice builds fairly fast, regardless of lake depth, as long as air temps stay cold.

But deep lakes have a huge mass of water, and it takes a long time of cold weather to turn over and freeze.

This is mostly a coastal phenom, because temps aren’t so severe as interior.

In Kodiak, we had a camp on an island in Karluk Lake, which is ~ 90 meters deep in places. Even in winters where the lake did freeze over, it took till middle January sometimes, and a few weeks later it would break up.....sometimes.

Of the 8 winters I lived there, Karluk only froze over three or four.

MTV

I've had that explained to me before and yes it is pretty neat, and amazing to think of a lake in Alaska not actually freezing in winter. Seton Lake where albravos cabin is located is apparently as much as 1500 feet deep. It's a big lake in a sort of freshwater fjord.
I fly into and fish Eutsuk Lake which is about parallel with the bottom of the Alaskan panhandle and inside the Coastal range. I asked about ice in winter and while I've found very few people that have even been there in the winter the ones who have said it doesn't actually freeze. Typically they see heavy snowfall before the lake freezes and the lake sits all winter with a pillow of snow floating on it. Have you ever seen that? What a hazard for the unwary ski pilot.

These large deep lakes are different no doubt. If they have little near shore water less than 15'/5m (the littoral zone) ice takes some time to form. Compounding that is flow through...lots of inlet streams and groundwater influx during heavy snow and rainy years. A running year round outlet if present tends to keep the water mixed and slow freezing. Winds also keep the cocktail well mixed.

FWIW here's some info on Kodiak's large lakes. Karluk that MTV mentions starts on page 77. New depth is 456'/~139m as reported by their remote autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV): http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/FedAidPDFs/FDS12-55.pdf

I worked at five mentioned on Kodiak in 1970-71 and despite winter ice they were never warm enough to swim in summer. Intentionally...unless a hot sauna was close by.

Gary

PA1195 wrote:I worked at five mentioned on Kodiak in 1970-71 and despite winter ice they were never warm enough to swim in summer. Intentionally...unless a hot sauna was close by.

Gary

As in the Queen’s Outhouse on Camp Island.

MTV

Walk wires? MTV you must be (or have been) pretty spry. My Beavers never had them (Wipline), and I’m sure I looked at them on the Cessna’s and said nope, not going to do that. Nobody else I knew did either. Same guys that said don’t bother with the external paddle, we’re never gonna paddle.