Originally Posted by
SNS3Guppy
If you're trimmed for the climb, you're trimmed close to the glide. In general terms, your best glide speed will closely approximate your sea level best rate of climb speed (Vy), and your minimum sink glide speed will closely approximate your sea level best angle of climb speed (Vx). If you're trimmed for one of these speeds on the climb, a power loss will result in a trimmed descent at that speed if you don't get involved (i.e. pulling back and interfering with the airplanes ability to do it's job...remain stable).
Are you sure?
(EnglishAl's post, to which the quoted response was specifically related, was highlighting the need to be aggressive in establishing the nose down glide attitude in a sudden engine failure on take-off (not just a bit of rough running).)
To be more specific, I understand the point that you are trimmed for an AoA so the change in excess power from positive to negative should over time result in the same airspeed but a sink rate rather than a rate of climb.
BUT, with a sudden lack of power, the aircraft flight path needs to move from say 6 degrees up (750 fpm climb @ 75kts) to 6 degrees down (typical 1 in 10 glide ratio), which it will do pretty quickly, but the airframe needs to rotate the same 12 degrees at the same rate that your climb moves to descent (i.e. fast) otherwise your AoA will be temporarily increasing, increasing drag, loosing airspeed and sapping energy out to rotate the aircraft.
All of this added to the fact that until you are level, part of the lift vector is slowing you down and you need to get most of the way through the rotation before you have eliminated the deceleration from drag, induced drag and the rearward component of lift.