Winter in Michigan

A couple days ago I went out to the airport, wrapped up the front end
of the Deb with a two layer blanket, fired up the Tannins Heater and
figured I'd change the oil the next day.

Welll... as things go, that was the day it snowed, and snowed, and
snowed. Fortunately the heavy stuff went South of us, but we still
ended up with close to 5 inches.

I made it out this after noon with a case of oil, a box of matches
(for the big catalytic heater), drain hose, wrenches, etc... All
ready to change the oil.

When I opened the hanger door I was greeted by a pile of snow.
The snow started on the fuselage just behind the read seats and was
over a foot deep at the top of the windshield. The windshield was
completely coated with ice as the heat from the engine compartment had
warmed it just enough to melt some of the snow.

Now, the cowl was well wrapped with two layers of very good
insulation. Still, heat leaks out. There was no snow on the top but
there were icicles at the rear of the cowl and hanging off the lower
parts of the blanket that were over an inch to maybe an inch and a
half thick. There must be about an inch of ice running along the wing
root back a ways.

The heat leaking through that blanket had melted over a foot of snow
which had run down and then froze. Man, but that was one heavy
blanket. I threw it in the back of the 4-Runner, and hung it in the
shop to dry.

Tomorrow I'm going back out with a broom and shovel. (and maybe
another heater too)

BTW, this is after the heater (visible to the back left) had been on
for an hour of so. http://www.rogerhalstead.com/833r_ice.htm

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

Roger

Roger ) wrote:

When I opened the hanger door I was greeted by a pile of snow.
The snow started on the fuselage just behind the read seats and was
over a foot deep at the top of the windshield. The windshield was
completely coated with ice as the heat from the engine compartment had
warmed it just enough to melt some of the snow.

Just think, you will be looking around your hanger on a hot August day
wondering how all that snow could have caused you so much work.

--
Peter

Why was there snow inside your hangar? Isn't the reason why we keep planes
inside is to avoid stuff like this?

Roger wrote:

When I opened the hanger door I was greeted by a pile of snow.

Got a hole in the roof?

George Patterson
He who marries for money earns every penny of it.

On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 16:55:41 GMT, "Viperdoc"
wrote:

Why was there snow inside your hangar? Isn't the reason why we keep planes
inside is to avoid stuff like this?

You would tend to think so, wouldn't you? :-))

Notice how neatly the snow is piled on top of the Deb and no where
else.

This apparently requires the wind to be from a specific direction to
blow the snow in through the ridge vent. The vent is just a piece of
metal folded over the ridge which would be fine except the roof itself
is barn metal. That means the distance between the vent and the roof
varies quite a bit. Other wise they could just get a piece of roof
vent that has the mesh (sorta like a Scotch Brite (TM) pad, but
without being abrasive.) between it and the roof surface.

That keeps out snow and critters. That would be nice as I counted
about a dozen paper wasp nests up there. They weren't a problem last
Summer as I hosed the whole thing down with bug killer.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 18:29:11 GMT, George Patterson
wrote:



Roger wrote:

When I opened the hanger door I was greeted by a pile of snow.

Got a hole in the roof?

Long skinny one called a ridge vent:-))

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

George Patterson
He who marries for money earns every penny of it.

Got a hole in the roof?

Long skinny one called a ridge vent:-))

Man, I've had a little snow come in our ridge vent, but never anything like
that.

Musta been a heckuva storm.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Fri, 28 Jan 2005 04:35:26 GMT, "Jay Honeck"
wrote:

Got a hole in the roof?

Long skinny one called a ridge vent:-))

Man, I've had a little snow come in our ridge vent, but never anything like
that.

Musta been a heckuva storm.

As much as I'd like to play up the huge storm story... :-))... We
didn't have drifts that deep outside. There is a valley that funnels
the snow into the ridge vent when the wind is from either the North or
East, but it's a very narrow range for either. Outside those narrow
angles I don't get snow blown in, but man when the wind is just right
it collects the snow from about a third of the roof and dumps it
straight down from the vent.

They are going to try and plug it with something like the mesh that is
used in commercial ridge vents. Unfortunately the roof is "barn metal"
with the irregular shape which makes it difficult to seal against.
They may have to put down plates (metal strips) to give a flat surface
for a commercial vent to work against. Then seal the low spots with
expandable foam. It'd probably only take 5 or 6 cans.

There is one hanger for sale out there, but the sucker is big enough
the house a Gulf Stream. I guess I could get it and rent out spaces,
but it's one big hanger and it does have heat. Unfortunately that'd be
like trying to heat all of Lower Michigan. OTOH I might be able to
rent out enough space to make the payments. :-))

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

Roger,
Where do you base in Michigan? We used to live in Whitehall then
spent a couple of years in Houghton. Both places are near the Great
Lakes so snow was expected almost everyday during the winter. VFR
flying days during winter time are probably as rare as blue moons. We
have enjoyed the much milder weather in NY but it still takes quite a
bit of work to go flying in winter.
We have been up in the air only 3 times since the beginning of the
year. The first after the new year put us in unexpected freezing rain.

A week later, with 6" or more of snow, we had to rescue our plane
from it nose-up, tail-down position (along with all but one highwing,
tricyle planes on the field). The balmier weather the next few days was
even worse with wet slushy snow. We should have rushed to airport to
clean out the snow but went to the gym first. By the time we got there,
the wet snow had turned to hardened ice. It took us 2 days for the
deicing job using all the tools and tricks that we could think of
(isopropyl alcohol, hair dryer, garbage bags filled with hot water and
lots of elbow grease). A friend was also on the field deicing his
C180. The snow and ice came before he got around to put on his
wingcover. He fashioned a device to hold the hose connecting to his
propane heater over the ice while mopping up the water with rags. We
both finished up at the same time (after two days) but he was still on
the ground after both Rick and I had our flights. It turned out that
after all the hard work, he found out that his battery was dead after 3
nonflying weeks.
The big snow storm last week (probably the same one that you
experienced) brought over a foot of snow. After digging ourselves out
of the house with the handy new snowblower the next day, we rushed to
airport and could barely get through the gate zigzagging trhough piles
of snow drifts. There was no way that we could approach our plane and
there was no place to park. A glance at tiedown planes brought a sense
of relief because the high winds had blown all the snow off. We came
back two days later and could just barely get to our plane. It only
took few hours to shovel snowdrifts around the plane but there was a
huge mountain of snow right in front of the our tiedown spot (we had #1
spot next to the electrical outlet but also a great place for temporary
snow 'storage'). We did not get to fly until last Thursday. In
lowering the flaps for preflight, we discovered that the strong winds
had blown lots of snow into all the crevices. It took another hour or
two to scoop out the hard packed snow from the tailcone, under the
plane 'armpit' and inside the hinge openings in the wings.
It takes a lot of work to keep flying in the winter, cleaning out
the forst, deicing, snow removal, preheating etc. However, every hour
up is worth the 3 to 10 hours of preparation. The plane gets to
pattern altitude almost instantly, we have pretty much unlimited
visibility and can see almost from Albany to New York City. In few
minutes, we are lifted up over the snowcovered hills, crowded malls,
shopping center and are rewarded with the breathtaking view of the
Hudson river and the Catskill mountain. The air is always crisp and
calm. This beats flying in the summer haze, the spring turbulence or
the fall foggy weather.