Reading this, watching videos and just generally reading through this IFR section of POA really sounds super exciting. Can't wait to get my IFR ticket and upgrade my plane to modern IFR standards, although I'll have to do it gradually over time to keep some gas money available so I still get to fly haha. One thing I worry about IFR where I live (frozen tundra north of y'all), most IFR days probably equal to bad icing days as well. Am I correct in that assumption? For those of you who live in the northern half of the U.S. do you actually get to fly a real IFR in GA aircraft without known icing capabilities?
From reading your posts, I suspect that you're like me in that you enjoy flight planning, flying cross country, and talking to ATC. IFR is my favorite type of flying. It's unbelievably satisfying to me. Knowing and following the rules, speaking the lingo, reading the weather.... and putting it all together to break out of the clouds and find the runway right in front of you. It's awesome.
Compared to you, I live in the tropics, but here's some thoughts. With a little experience and a lot of care, a non-fiki airplane is quite usable in the winter. Most days, the layer is not thick and fairly "dry". The majority of winter days it's quite possible to pop through a 1000' layer and not see any ice.
The FIP/CIP product put out by AWC has been really reliable for me; i assume canadia had something similar. If it shows below 50% chance of trace ice, I'll go. The skew-t pretty reliably shows layers and temperatures. Here, there's often a "warm nose"... an inversion that puts the cloud layer above freezing, although I suspect you'll see less of that. Pireps round out my icing big 3. I'm fortunate in that there's usually been a bizjet or a regional jet come in to my field within the last hour, and these are clearly the most reliable way to know bases & tops.
Obviously "dry clouds" is a bit of an oxymoron, but the thin layers that aren't making precipitation usually won't create much ice either. I've had ice 3 times, all trace: twice in the tops of rain clouds in June, and once in January when the clouds were juicier than I expected. It was a thin layer that I was only in for about 30s, and it sublimated quickly in the sunshine on top. You might more often see clouds that are already frozen. Below -10 or so the water is already frozen and won't stick to the plane. Around here if it's that cold I'm probably not flying anyway. My heater will keep me warm down to about -20, but pulling her in & out of the hangar just sucks too much.
At your latitude ice will be a threat for most of the year. The most important thing is to have a plan B. That, and don't plan to fly IN the clouds, fly through them to reach clear air on top. A minute of exposure is not going to kill you if the forecast misses, but 10min can. You CAN pick up lethal amounts of ice in a minute, but those situations are obvious and easy to avoid. In my experience Canadians are more pragmatic about ice than Americans, presumably because they have to deal with it more. A lot of the stuff I've picked up has been from postings by Canadian pilots.
Now after all that, here's the disclaimer.... you can pick up ice in any visible moisture near or below 0C. Don't screw around with it. Study it a lot, and creep up on it until you find your comfort level in your area. It's like playing with snakes, a lot of people just decide it's not worth it, and that's fine. Guys on the western shore of Michigan just can't fly IFR in the winter because the clouds are always loaded with moisture. I have no idea what the weather is like in your area, but the above is what works for me, here.
