How cold will you fly?

[apex ak]

What do you think a good cut off is? -20 -30 -40 It is -40 in McGrath AK.

[iowa]

the coldest i ever flew was out of
my brother norm's place near Tinah, Mn one winter.
i woke up on sun am and it was -17F
(not very cold for most of you N flyers!)
we threw a blanket over the cowl
and use a space heater for a couple of hours.
it takes 2.5 hrs to get to GC
and the oil temp gauge did not budge for most of that time.
now i fly if T is above 40F
dave

[yukontools]

Apex...I error on the conservative side of things and -20 would be my cut-off for most flying. I think it depends on what you are planning on doing that day. If you are going cross country it may be warmer at altitude. If you have the same Winterization Kit (the silver stuff) as I do you may need to add some strips at -40. T&G's would heat and cool you engine unnecessarily in my opinion. I plan on going fishing as soon as the temps increase. Two weeks ago I flew at 10 above and my oil temp was 190. Last week at -2 my oil temp was 160. Good Luck.

[flat country pilot]

-29 F. There are usually other weather factors that limit my flying before the temp. -20 F to -30 F can be a real nice day if there is no wind and a clear sky.

Bill

[hilltop170]

-20° F is my cut-off. Period. Below that things stop working like they should, machines and people. And you better have your arctic grade survival gear ready to deploy.......FAST. At anything below 0°F I have to have a REAL good reason to fly anywhere. The engine will run in those temps but if anything happens and you have to make an unplanned landing and you so much as sprain an ankle, it can be fatal.

I have over 20 years flying in Alaska and working remote locations in the arctic and have a pretty good understanding of cold weather survival but I sure don't want to have to USE any of that knowledge for real. I know how uncomfortable it can get in a hurry. Your options go away rapidly.

How long will it take for help to arrive? Maybe 6 hours, maybe a couple of days? Go stand outside at -20°F and see how long you are comfortable. Then think about having a sprained ankle where you can't walk or move around well enough to set up your camp and get warm. And what if it's more than a sprained ankle? Not good.

How many fly wearing their heavy weight arctic survival gear? Not too comfortable is it? So we take it off and throw it in the back seat thinking, I'll just grab it if I need it. Then the thing is on fire and all you have time to do is get out as fast as you can to save your own hide. Then while you watch it burn you start thinking, I wish I was wearing that survival gear that just burned up.

Like the old NTSB investigator said who gave me my first winter C.A.P. checkride in Alaska back in 1983, "You'll either live or die with what you're wearing". He had seen it for himself.

-20°F is cold enough for me. Of course if you're in McGrath or Galena you won't get in much flying in the winter if -20° is your cutoff. Just put the odds in your favor by minimizing your risks.

[GAHorn]

I spent the better part of 20 mins trying to get my O-300 started in +17F one day when I had no way to preheat. I ended up using a ground power unit because the battery couldn't crank it after a few tries. Six shots of prime and one shot loaded in reserve is what it took after 15 minutes finding a GPU that could deliver 12 volts. I had poured a coffee cup of gasoline into the oil during the first two attempts as a poor-man's method of oil dilution. It still took almost 10 minutes of idling before I felt comfortable opening up the throttle past 1200 rpm.
You guys up in the real cold places can keep it. My pleasure flying limit is near the freezing range. Real-work flying is a different thing, I don't mind colder...but only with turbines and support, as far as I'm concerned. (but I guess I'm spoiled down here in TX.)
My worst nightmare was in Enid, OK late on a dark Christmas eve back in the early '80's with a troublesome Twin Bo', temps in the high teens and wind blowing about 30 kts. I don't want anymore of that. Brrrrr.

[ak2711c]

Richard hit it on the head. The question really is, what is the coldest temp that you are willing to risk having to survive in for a few days? I fly with all my winter gear on and any passenger I carry does the same. I usually don't go if it is much below zero. But sometimes its a worthy cause and I go at colder temps.
Shawn

[mit]

Why do I want to fly? Medivac? Fun? Wolf hunt? Ice fish? Go to warmer area?

[yukontools]

Flying in my plane you'd be a fool to remove your arctic gear and toss it in the back even when above 0 and if you did I'd have to chip you out of the left seat when we landed. I had an interesting landing in Fairbanks once with my 3 children. I had a slight right cross while landing on 19L, On touch down my right wing lifted slighty as I wasn't completely coordinated and once the wings were the way they were supposed to be I added right rudder and power to change the gradual left turn I was starting (the start of a ground loop) but I saw no change. I pushed even harder on my right rudder and nothing happened. With a light speed glance I saw my size 13 Bunny Boot hung up on the lip between the other set of controls. I moved my boot slightly and to my delight had quick response with my big trusty rudder. Here is what I thought I heard the controller say..."Take that taxiway, there's a 180 on final with 8 lives". Only after I was on the taxiway I realized his humor. What he said was, Do a 180, take the next taxiway, you have 8 lives left."

I carry the Bunny Boots with me and have a smaller pair of winter boots that I am comfortable in at -20. As mentioned already is "What you leave the plane with may be all that you have." My dad has a pack that slips over the back of his right seat with a handle on it and after you slip your seatbelt off that should be the first thing you grab. I saw a guy with a Scout that had all his survival gear stuffed as far back in the plane as it could get. Weight and balance are important but make sure the important stuff is very handy. -26 right now so I am staying close to the woodstove.

[pdb]

As mentioned already is "What you leave the plane with may be all that you have." .

The southcentral Alaska version of this saying was developed by the search teams that arrived at numerous crash sites where there wasn't much useful left after impact.

" What you are wearing and the gear stuffed in your pockets is your survival gear. What you left in the back of the plane is your camping gear."

[MoonlightVFR]

Planned flight from anchorage to St.louis, MO.

09 Degrees f. at ANCHORAGE. Take off , head N E to Alaska Highway (a.k.a. Snow Packed Gravel Raod). Turn right to outside. Landing Northway Junction.

Cabin is comfortable OAT is 29 degrees f.

I am a 170 Outside pilot in right seat. Joe A. is pilot/owner this Piper Arrow. He had trained me for this moment. Get visual on runway 8-10 miles out. I start squirming in my seat prior to landing.

Do you remember the early VW Bug's heater? Full on or Full off. Most small aircraft are similar type heater operation.

It is minus - 0.49 F degrees on the ground at Northway Jct. Yes minus --.49 degrees. Most pilots have never experienced such a landing so why don't you fly along with us as we begin our descent into that tiny tiny black ribbon runway. I squirm some more and pull out two (2) credit cards a Visa and an American Express Card. We note that the plume of vapor from power plant stack is rising straight up. A no surface wind landing. Joe eases back the power and settles in on the gages. Absolutely NO TALKING and Minimal Breathing until we are on the ground, a little lower and a little slower, descent has started. A last glance around the sky for traffic and then it happens! Super cold air causes the windscreens and windows to instanly freeze over from the inside. Fully iced. Our Breathing/ respiration is freezing on inside. Severe Clear outside airframe is clean. You cannot see the prop, the runway or anything. ICE COFFIN I think! Now I start to work with the credit cards reaching over to windscreen in front of pilot I start scraping the ice off the inside. It reforms instantly. The lower we decend the colder it is and the faster I have to scrape. My job is to keep a 6"x6" space free of ice and in line of sight for pilot to see the runway. 2000 ft 104 K indicated, keep on scraping. Pilot is as steady as Cool Hand Luke. 1200ft pull a little power, keep on scraping and we are coming home. keep on scraping , the shaved ice is piling up on pilot's knees, keep on scraping, it looks like it is snowing inside the airplane, keep on scraping, staying alive , staying alive. Then Joe announces "We're There" closes throttle and rolls it on with hardly a sound. I make more noise stepping off a curb. Happy Landings.

[AR Dave]

Grady - hope you are coming back to the Petit Jean 170 and plan on staying longer this time.

[GAHorn]

Grady makes an excellent point. If you are a '53 or later B-owner, pull full hot defrost on when if really cold wx even if you don't need the feet heat. (You have checked your defrost for full flow, right?)

[apex ak]

Lots of good info. I am always curious of peoples cutoff. One of my biggest concerns has been my oil temp. I have the oil sump blocked and the top half of the cowl taped off and I still only get the oil temp up to maybe 140, not to good. I have been flying pretty much once a week, all winter. My personal cut off is -30 . I wear arctic gear and a survival vest always... On another note I purchase my 53 b from a man in Kansas City MS. and flew it up a year ago. A very fun trip.

[apex ak]

Correction: that would be Kansas City MO. not MS.