Wanting a little more room than the ol' PA12 has.
I was thinking a 180 but maybe a Maule would get off the water sooner???
Needs to be mainly a Float Plane and Ski's / Wheels secondary.
Performance wise does anybody know how the various maules M5/M6/M7 would compare with a 470 powered 180 on floats?
Looking at a 2-3 pax capable plane with some baggage room.
I'm 6'4" not sure about headroom in the Maules.
Is the 7 different than the 5 in the headroom department?

You may not fit in a Maule.
I'm 6'4" and there's not enough leg room for me. My knees hit the panel but I'm all legs so YMMV.

The head room for the pilot will be the same in all of them. I've had a 4, a 5, and currently an MX7. They're all the same fuselage. The M7 has the little hump for headroom for the 5th seat, otherwise it's also the same. UtahMaule is probably your size and manages to fit in one pretty well. I guess it's a matter of how bad you want to make it work and what your tolerance is for comfort (or the lack there of). A Maule is like a jeep. Some love 'em and others hate 'em. I happen to be a lover because mine fits my mission perfectly...STOL with utility and no frills.

My current plane spent part of its life on floats in AK with a previous owner. That is the extent of my float plane experience and all of my Maule experience is on wheels...so take this for what it's worth. Its seems that the different models should compare to each other similarly on floats as they do wheels. As to performance, the longer wings will get off sooner. M5s have the shortest wing at 30'10". Most M6s and M7s will have the "Universal" 32'11" wing. There are a few M7s and MX7s that have the "A" wing which is 33'8" and has about 5" more flap than the universal wing. The "A" wing will win every time in STOL comparison. I would think that you would want to compare a Universal or A Wing Maule to the 180 for an accurate comparison.

One drawback that I can think of is the legal useful load may start to get small on floats. Otherwise, all three of my Maules were much more fun to fly and handled much lighter than either of the straight tail 182s that I've owned. And for STOL comparison, my long wing Maule and the old 182s aren't even in the same league.

Now maybe some guys with float experience will give you more answers that you're looking for.

TangoFox wrote:I'm 6'4" not sure about headroom in the Maules.

Headroom will be less of a problem than leg room. I'm a fairly short legged 6'2" and with the seats all the way back I'm good to go. Not great for putting people in the back seat though, I'm pretty much in their lap. My 6'4" buddy with regular legs would have a hell of a time operating the rudder peddles.

Definitely true one on for size before you get your heart set on one.

You just don't see any Maule's here in float country, the one's that I heard about that were tried did not last. I assume the shorter wings had a lot to do with it, don't know how the useful load compares. I assume there was a reason why Garth did not keep his Maule that was on floats very long and switched to Cessna, (maybe he will chime in). I am 6'3", have several hours in PA 12's, the Cessna is more comfortable leg room wise for me.

Steve

There are many differences in space on the front seats.
There have been two different seats plus a patroller seat used in the various Maules.
The later seat has higher backrest and moves further back than earlier seat. Not interchangeable without some welding.
Early cushioning was very thick and headroom can be reduced by a whopping 4.5 " between the different cushion setups.
Backrest cushioning which along with the 5 position fore aft slide rails controls legroom can also vary by 3.5"in cushioning and 4" slides.
Those with the large skylight have more headroom than without thiough the small skylight is the same headroom as no skylight.
One of my customers 6'8" could fit in his bosses two Maules but could not fit in the Pilatus PC6 because of the low panel crosstube.
So, try sitting in one with max room and one with least room.
It is very much up to the torso/leg length ratio of the individual.
Floatplane performance was compared to me by another customer who flew his own M7-235 on Aqua 2400 floats plus the Government SuperCubs and C185s both on floats from a small floatpond behind his house on the Yukon river.
Only the Maule could come out of the pond loaded. The Cub and C185 came out light and were then loaded down on the big river.
See the list of 42 different Maule models on my website for models and basic spec and years built.

As Jeremy notes, there are two issues with height: Torso length, which governs headroom issues, and leg length, which has an effect on panel clearance. I've met guys who were really tall and had long torsos, and could not fit in an airplane that another similarly tall guy could easily fit in, because that guy had long legs.....not a long torso.

I've flown an M-7, an M-6 and an M-5 all on floats a fair bit. As Jeremy says, kept to legal gross weight, they are all great performers, especially the ones with the "universal wing". But, even the M-5 performs well on floats, assuming it's got the 235 hp engine (which is the only one I've flown).

The tradeoff, however, is load. Find one on floats, and perform a realistic load calculation. Our M-7 on Baumann floats with full fuel (as in full mains and full tips) was essentially a two place and some baggage airplane. If you could keep the fuel load to mains only, it was a good three place airplane. But, the mains aren't all that big, so range is limited.

If you're even considering salt water ops, I wouldn't, frankly. I'm not convinced that the corrosion proofing on any of the Maules is up to that.....which of course is true of many production rag and tube airplanes.

Finally, there is simply no comparison between the Cessna 180 and the Maule, on floats or on wheels. And, I'm not suggesting that one is better than the other. The Maule will kick ass on any 180 performance wise, but the 180 carries more and has a much better range capability, and there are other ways they are very different airplanes. Both GREAT airplanes in their own right, but....

Not meaning to bad mouth the airplanes at all, they can be a great two place or minimal three place airplane on floats, and performance is great.

And, Jeremy, whoever told you that a Cub won't come out of Alexander Lake loaded (and I'm pretty sure I know who that is) is full of it.....I've come out of there at 2000 pounds a number of times with Cubs, and maybe a time or two a skoshi bit over that.

Nevertheless, the Maule is a great performing seaplane.

MTV

MTV , Galena. Legal gross on all three for comparison.

I had a newer MX180C that had the new style wing. I put a TON of hours on it. It was a great plane, but I got rid of it because I didn't feel like I could stay proficient with the tail-wheel in x-winds. It really limited where and under what wind conditions I could fly in. On floats I think it would be a different story!

As for the 6'4" issue... As long as there is't going to be a passenger behind you, it will work fine with the seat all the way back. A buddy of mine used to fly with me and he was 6'5". He was a little cramped but never whined much about it...

Jim

Put a Mooney on floats...they have plenty of head room!

maules.com wrote:MTV , Galena. Legal gross on all three for comparison.

Alexander Lake is the float pond in Galena.

MTV

piperpainter wrote:Put a Mooney on floats...they have plenty of head room!

Oookay, but you'll just be paddling around in tight little right hand circles due to the prop tips spankin' water.

bumper
Mooney 201 too.

$00000.02 worth of info...

Have been to the factory and flown with Ray. Met the team and liked what I saw. I still wonder if I should of bought a four seater sometimes. A seaplane lane at the factory is pretty neat too. They had a turbine Maule there, it was about 800K.

My underlying preference is stick and tandem. As can be deduced from my "handle".

piperpainter wrote:Put a Mooney on floats...they have plenty of head room!

Retractable floats!
There's an idea.