adamtina6

Hello all,
My flying partner just got a Top Flite 1/5th scale Cessna 182. He is interested to know if there are floats that have the wheels built in so he can permanently mount them. This will be his first experience on the water. I flew a scratch built flying boat many, many years ago, so we are both kind of excited.
Any help with the floats would be great.

Smoky

hi! I looked into this possibility awhile back.
Do you use a paved or a grass runway? The reason I ask is wheeled landing gear are designed to flex and take the shock out of a rough landing or rough ground.

Float struts are designed to be rigid, the water displacement under the floats cushions the plane.
If your float mounts flexed it would be terrible handing on water! and possible cause you to go fishing a few times.

If you use floats (even with wheels!) the shock will go straight into the plane and possibly cause you more grief with stress or fractures on the plane, or plain old knocking things loose and causing a future wreck.

I know there is a few threads in here about that very thing. and one person is actually building a set, tho I cannot remember who. It may be possible if you can cushion the wheels under the floats. but not sure of the cost for a set up like that.

For regular floats I recommend Ralph's (seaplane) "just plane fun" floats. I have a set and love them.
I can switch from wheels to floats in about 10 minutes.
hope this helps.
Smoky.

adamtina6

Thanks Smoky,
I have drawn up some scratch floats but I don't know if my friend is confident in my ability or not.
We fly off a grass field.
We may try some "off the shelf" floats with a small modification here or there if we can't find anything.

Thanks again,