I am not a pro at float flying, but I do fly off water and I have read everything I can find from the past several years about floats and from what I can tell, the idea that the step must be 1/4 inch behind the CG is bunk.

There was a recent article in RCM, as I recall, about converting fun fly planes to floats. Now they have a lot more elevator authority than a trainer, but it's worth a read. He recommends 3 inches back. I have also seen it written several times to locate the step at 40% of the MAC. 40% would give you about an inch and a half on a 12 inch chord-more if the wing is broader.

It was explained that the step is similar to the main gear on a tri-gear plane. If the main gear is right on the CG, then the plane rotates easily, but can also tend to skip of landing. With the step further back, the plane takes more elevator to rotate, but tends to skip less. On a plane with the main gear further back, when you touch, the nose drops and you get less bounces.

One of the problems with "store bought" floats is if you get the step too far back, the amount of float that extends out in front of the prop is short. The shorter the floats in front of the nose, the more critical it is that you make a good landing or you can dig the nose in.

I am flying an old Sig Fazer with a 5-year old Tower .46. My step is 2-2 1/2 inches back from the CG and I have had no trouble at all taking off and my landings have been without skips.

The bottom line, in my opinion, is there is no universal truth when it comes to step location, only opinions. The authors all say they like this location and use it on all their planes. They never tell you what else they tried and what they didn't like. And no one has ever run a test, to my knowledge, with the step at various locations. I may have to do this one of these days.

You are probably too far back, but I wouldn't panic. Move it forward to about half of what you've got, 1 1/2 inches, and try it. You also might try running a long strip of 1/8 ply, maybe 3/16, about an inch wide, set vertically between your attachment points with several holes drilled so you can adjust the mounting fore and aft.

I also think much of the landing problems are from poor landings and would result in about the same thing on water, grass or pavement. If you are going to get your plane into a semi-stalled condition with the nose up, set up a high sink rate and plop it down, you can look for a bent nose gear on the ground or a nose over in the water.