Is farm strip flying good for you ?

[Capt Kremmen]

Flying a STOL Zenair 701 with fixed leading edge slots and with a decent breeze on the nose we frequently get 'out' and 'in' within about 200 ft.

The attraction of farm strip flying for me, is not only the precision of arrival and departure but also the tranquillity of remote strips, very often miles from traffic noise and other disturbance.

In a generally noisy world this is a precious resource.

[Lone_Ranger]

Puts hairs on your chest

[Capt Kremmen]

Mrs Kremmen wouldn't like that !

[irish seaplane]

Back when I used to be able to fly freely, untethered by wife or family, I perfected farm strip flying and then progressed to landing all the odd ball places that I could find. Beaches, roads, silage fields, frozen lakes and model flying fields. The model airplane guys couldn't get over a full size Cessna in full stopped and out of 174 meters. Nil wind so no cheating. I'm not as good as I used to be, and got hooked on a twin for my sins. Farm strips in a retractable with small wheels can be 3x the challenge of good short field airplane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yr--...4ds2wBlL09N6dA

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

Model flying fields - ah yes, I once took the Yak 52 to one of those (by arrangement). Didn't land, but I gave them a memorable visit!

.....but also the tranquillity of remote strips, very often miles from traffic noise and other disturbance.

That reminds me how strips can be useful 'bolt holes'. Years ago I was scud running back to base and it was getting seriously dodgy under a lowering cloudbase and in heavy rain. I flashed over the rooftops of Stafford, all wet and shiny, the M6 with the cars with their headlights on, and up ahead the wx looked worse. What to do? I didn't fancy a 180 as the stuff I'd come though wasn't good. Up ahead was a strip; "that's for me"!

We landed, shut down, and slid the canopy back. Just the whining of the running down gyros, the tincking of the hot engine, the sound of birds singing, and a tractor working in a distant field.

I can still remember the peace and tranquility of that place, and the relief of being on terra firma after the pressures of being in the air when we really shouldn't have been.

[9 lives]

tranquility of remote

I took my daughter camping in the flying boat a few weeks ago. We flew to a remote lake, a half hour flight from home. In the middle of the night, I thought I had gone deaf, as I realized that I had not heard a thing for what seemed like hours. Then I heard a pine cone drop from a high branch some distance away, and it bounced off many branches on the way to the ground. Then I fell back asleep knowing that that is how thing should be

[Above The Clouds]

The 2014 Valdez STOL competition, the Cub landed in 67 feet and took off in 61 feet


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwCcQq38i8

[Capt Kremmen]

That's staggeringly economical !

At www.zenair.com there are library stills and videos by the bucketload showing STOL departures and arrivals.

[Monocock]

Farm strip flying is great fun. Off piste flying is even better.

[foxmoth]

Often the biggest problem with farms trips is finding ones that the owners will allow you to use! I have flown into ones with wires in the wrong place, ones that have such a slope that you need to land in one direction and take of in the other and many other problem fields, but often it is finding one where you need to go and getting permission in the first place that proves hardest!

[mary meagher]

Farm strips not too bad, compared with Red Lion Airport down in the pine woods in New Jersey.....the problem there is that the airport is closely surrounded on ALL SIDES by tall trees. So you are coming down the approach with a headwind, which when you get low vanishes altogether and is useless for tempering the touchdown speed. Or you take off and just above the awkward height discover that there is a howling wind dead cross. At least the electric wires at the ends of the runway are festooned with a couple of conspicuous red plastic balls.

Landing in a farm field is routine for gliders. But I did manage to get it wrong flying a Raleigh Minerva into a farm strip; the strip was just a tad short and I ended up nosed over in the turnips. Fortunately no damage. Nice soft mud.

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

Often the biggest problem with farms trips is finding ones that the owners will allow you to use!

Nothing beats a face to face request. There was a strip in deepest Cheshire, not far from here, that AFAIK hadn't been used in a long time, and the farmer had a bit of as reputation as 'an awkward bugger'. As it's the nearest 'airfield' to SSD towers, I wanted it in the log book.

One Saturday morning I pedaled round there on my bicycle and knocked on his door:

"Hello. I'd love to land at your strip in our Chipmunk. Any chance you'd be happy for me to do that?"

"Um, OK, I suppose. When?"

"This afternoon?"

"Um, yes... OK"

Rode home, drove to the airfield and wheeled out the aeroplane, flew in to the strip! Even Manchester ATC were helpful (the strip is in the Control Zone).

[Solar]

To answer the op's question I fail to see how farm strip flying can be good for us, I mean it teaches us almost complete airmanship properly, provides us with endless fun and excitement and is the reason a large percentage of us learned to but is mostly unregulated.
I mean how can we do this sort of thing without more regulation, we're doomed we are.
I have a share in a Citabria (Flapped model) and the guy we bought it of said it was " a farmers plane" and he was correct.
Great fun.