34DD,
No appologies required.I should point out that there was an entire second para that I deleted due to the fact that it was off thread topic and I was aiming at as simple an explanation as possible for Davaar.
My aerodynamics text books are packed due to moving to Singapore this afternoon so I'm trusting to memory however,
If you resolve the individual lift and drag vectors into one resultant then that resultant is equal to weight so you have a balance however you must tilt the lift vector forward to achieve that balance otherwise the a/c slows down and lift decreases. Increasing AOA is not going to work as it will also increase Induced Drag.So by lowering the nose and tilting the lift vector forward you maintain IAS thereby maintaining lift , all be it reduced compared to that which the a/c wing produced when traveling 20 or 30 knots faster,and when that reduced lift is added to the drag acting back along the flight path(remember the drag vector now has a vertical component)it equals weight.
All said and done I prefer the thinking of primary vectors as strings on which you pull to discover the resultant,it's simple.
MM.