As usual, the response to my post ought to convince anyone with any
sense that the best policy is to shut up.  Never did have any sense.
First let me make a confession:  No, I have never found myself in an
inadvertent spin in IMC.  If that is the requirement for comment on the
subject, I suspect the string will be short.  I have found myself in a
number of unanticipated and difficult situations so I don't have any
problem understanding that, when those things happen, rational analysis
is difficult or impossible.  That is one reason why I try to create a
sizeable buffer between what I am actually doing and the most I can
handle.  I also recognize that, despite all possible prudence, we can
and, if we fly long enough, will find ourselves in a serious pickle that
we did not create and should not have anticipated.  A critical autopilot
malfunction is obviously fits that bill.  I have experienced autopilot
glitches like that both in and out of IMC and I know for a fact that it
takes a second or two to get the situartion under control, most of which
involves sitting there with your mouth open thinking "what the *****".
My comments on prevention were not intended to address those situations.
On the other hand, the string seemed to me to be searching for a way for
other pilots to deal with the possibility of an inadvertent IMC spin.  I
do not apologize for the notion that prevention is a part of an
intelligent approach to the problem.

That said, I don't buy the "instantaneous stall" concept in most cases.
Granted, if you have just rotated or are climbing at best angle to
comply with the angle requirements of a departure procedure, it could
happen.  In that case, I think that I would probably not be on autopilot
at all.  Absent reason to do otherwise, my climbout speed is 160K.
Stalling from that speed would take either several seconds, some really
radical control inputs or both.  One of the things that my military
training ingrained in me is that you cannot stall at zero G.  I think if
I was confused by some unanticipated event, my tendancy would be to
reduce G for long enough to assess the situation and come up with a
plan.

I was also taught to "step on the ball" to recover from a spin.  It is
particularly useful for inverted spins where it may be hard to figure
out the direction of rotation but it would be useful in IMC too.  I am
told, however, that some airplanes have spin characteristics in which
the ball does not necessarily go to the outside of the turn.  If anyone
knows about this I would certainly like to know.

John J. Halle
Stoel Rives LLP
900 SW 5th Avenue
Portland, Oregon 97204
(503) 294-9233 office
(503 545-4307 cell