Leadsled, you are of course correct not to compare a modern aircraft with a PBY. The techniques I described work for the three aircraft I named. I'm certainly not claiming that they would apply to any other. I obviously didn't make that clear. :o
cosmo, here's something that
was written.
We pass through ten thousand feet and for a moment steal an additional hundred feet so we can descend back through it. In the doing the ship can be set flying in a slightly nose-down position. Thus, "on the step" we will add better than ten knots to our air speed and also satisfy our sensual appreciation of flight. A mushing airplane, regardless of its speed, becomes a miserable contraption to any dedicated pilot. He absorbs this unhappiness through the seat of his pants. There is no reason to believe this will ever change regardless of aircraft design. A good pilot becomes morose and irritable in spite of what the most modern instruments proclaim unless his ship is "on the step." He will work endlessly to achieve that delicate angle and for this once and only once will prove the instruments wrong and the hair tips of his sensory powers more honest. When the instruments finally admit additional speed, then the pilot is doubly content, for he has proof that the instruments are not his absolute master and he is not as yet altogether a mechanical man.
[ 31 July 2001: Message edited by: pigboat ]