Posted for "terrence o'neill" <troneill@charter.net>:

 Barry,
    Fear it is. Three years after I left VP-4 I bought the last Waco, the
tail-prop Aristocraft, and a year and after making some driveline and landing
gear mods started test-flying it.  The first thing I realized I needed was an
angle of attack indicator, so I could SEE how close I was flying ot the stall
angle.
    Wings stall at ANGLE, not a speed.  I made one and put it on the left
wing, in my field of vision.  Just a simple vane, the tail-end of which
pointed at an angle-scale behind it.
    I took the plane up and stalled it a few times to see where the stall
angle was, and came down and marked the scale with a thin red strip of tape.
    Then I began to learn everything the Navy had NOT taught me about how
airplanes fly... and Navy training I thought was excellent ... better than
 the Air Force's, especially, for slow-flight.  Now I could stall the wing at
that precise stall angle repeatedly, and UNSTALL it precisely at that angle...
so I lost a minimum of altitude, instead of waiting to build airspeed and
guess how quickly to pull up to normal flight.  I could fly steep turns, and
hold the AOA a degree or two below the stall angle, and never stall.  I could
make steep turns onto final, watching the AOA, and not worry about stalling.
 I could actually fly around for an hour, just a degree below stall, zooming,
climbing, turning, and so on, and never stall.  The AOA followed my pitch
inputs like it had a string attached to the wheel.  And worry or FEAR was
gone.  I could approach and land just a few knots above stall speed --  but,
 I learned (by simulating a carrier landing with a 'bang') that to land at a
few knots above stall AOA I had to add power to get a little more speed if I
had to flare, because the Lift Coefficient curve of the NACA 4412 and most
airfoils bends forward at its peak... so when you're already flying at max
lift, below stall AOA, you can't get any more lift by increasing the angle...
you have to add a little V-squared.
    After a few flights with my new AOA I realized that I was having more fun
shooting landings -- I no longer feared flying slowly, and landing became a
lot more fun.
 
 The fear was gone.
 
 And my landings shorter.
 Terrence O'Neill
 N211AL 99%