Airplanes on skis ? (1 Viewer)

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I have ridden a motorbike many times on snow, you cant even drive a car on proper ice, with even the slightest camber in the road you slide into the gutter and stay there. Always a topic of discussion in Germany, we dont have a requirement to put winter tyres on in UK because they do nothing for what we get most "black ice" a film of ice that forms with a sudden fall in temperature.
 
I have ridden a motorbike many times on snow, you cant even drive a car on proper ice, with even the slightest camber in the road you slide into the gutter and stay there. Always a topic of discussion in Germany, we dont have a requirement to put winter tyres on in UK because they do nothing for what we get most "black ice" a film of ice that forms with a sudden fall in temperature
But why use skis when you could use studded tires like the group A WRC cars did
 
I imagine planes landing are coming down faster than it looks. The tires would go right through the snow. The skis spread out the weight across the snow. Airplanes are heavier than they look.
 
Again it s about weight distribution. If the skis had the same surface area as a tire as soon as it hits the snow its going to sink as the snow cannot support the weight. The landing gear would stop but the rest of the aircraft would continue going. Its like a 2 ton truck with tires in mud versus a 2 ton tank with treads.
 
I imagine planes landing are coming down faster than it looks. The tires would go right through the snow. The skis spread out the weight across the snow. Airplanes are heavier than they look.
So a group A rally car weighs close to 3,000 lbs and stops just fine on TIRES
 
Motorbike ice racing tires.....yikes

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So a group A rally car weighs close to 3,000 lbs and stops just fine on TIRES

Yes, but you're not dropping that rally car from a 20-foot height. There is a vertical motion component to an aircraft landing, and that's much more important than for a rally car which seldom gets more than a few feet above the ground.

The improved weight distribution afforded by skis is critical to cope with the vertical motion of the aircraft as it lands on snow and/or ice.
 
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Because they are unpowered, right?

Yes...and because direction at speed in an aircraft is managed by the rudder, not by the the wheels. Steering an aircraft at low speeds is accomplished using the brakes for single-engined aircraft and, to some extent, by brakes and differential application of power for multi-engined aircraft. Differential power still works on snow for aircraft like the Blenheim. For single-engined aircraft on snow, I'm guessing that the ground crew would simply dash out to the aircraft with a towing tractor and drag it back after it completed its landing run. I'm not aware of any fancier way of steering a fighter aircraft that was fitted with skis...but I'd be fascinated to learn if there was a more complicated steering mechanism.
 
As posted upthread, this forum thread covers virtually every type of aircraft used in WWII (and WWI, interwar and postwar) that operated in heavy snow (Finland, Eastern Front, Manchuria, Alaska, etc.):

It gives a good idea of how aircraft werw adapted for operation in deep snow.

In regards to vehicles driving in snow, that only happens as long as the vehicle's tires can reach a hard surface to gain traction. If the snow is too deep, the vehicle becomes snowbound. At that point, the only vehicle that can operate, is a tracked vehicle (like a snowmobile or Snowcat).
Same too, for an aircraft - if the snow can be cleared from the field (runway), then there's no need for skiis. If the snow is too deep, than skiis are the only option for the aircraft to come and go.
 
Does anyone have images of aircraft landing without skis and with snow?

Here's the end result of one...note where one set of main gear ended up, just next to the rear-mounted engine:

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This one slid off the runway...but studded tyres wouldn't have made a blind bit of difference.

Here's the write-up: United Airlines Commuter Jet Slides Off Runway, Rips Off Landing Gear in Rough Maine Landing


The only approach I've seen, other than fitting skis, is using oversized tyres. I've only seen this on small, fixed-undercarriage aircraft that have a tailwheel. The larger tyres perform a similar function to the skis by spreading the load more:

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