With the wonderful Lower Mainland winter weather not too far away, I’m wondering what methods other School’s are using for ground de-icing procedures (other than those lucky enough to be able to hanger their entire fleet!).
In the past we’ve used a hot water & methyl hydrate mix, but as methyl hydrate is a controlled substance (& toxic as hell!), we don’t want to continue using it!
Let me know what de-icing procedures you’re using.
Thanks.

Herman Nelson and a bunch of towels. Takes time but works well.

hazatude
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Joined: 11 Feb 2005
Posts: 5108
Location: Hamilton

Holy cralp - Haza's top poster - what happened to Cat Driver (I've been off-line too long it seems).

Glycol in a spray applicator

Isopropyl alcohol mixed with hot water

Our school uses RV Antifreeze (can't remember what chemical it is - pink fluid) and has it in the chemical/lawn and garden sprayers with the screw on top/pump handle thing.

One of our PA-44's had some non-STC'd engine pre heaters installed which our AME removed and affixed to the bottom of the metal sprayer cans.

They are set on a timer so they are always ready in the morning. The fluid is so thin that once it is on and melts the ice, you can T/O without removing the fluid.

Just be dead sure there is nothing on the wings still, because just spraying this on doesn't always do enough.

- Urine (fresh out of the "shipping container"... not cold)
- if the water (lake) is warmer, then a bucket of lake water that you pull on a string from the top of the wing
- Type 1 in little spray bottles from crappy tire
- hot water from inside

Room temperature isopropanol, spray application. Works like a dream for heavy frost, but any significant amount of ice and it's a waste of time. In that situation, half an hour in a heated hangar is much more efficient.

We tried out heated type 1 kit last year, where you screw a heater element into a hand sprayer. Turned out being a lot less useful than the isopropanol. Not much pressure and basically no volume, which (from what I understand about type 1) makes it pretty much useless. Got nice and hot in the sprayer, started cooling as soon as it left the nozzle.