I agree with you there, put the gear down and you slow way the hell down and
start dropping altitude

wrote:

On 13-Nov-2003, (Michael) wrote:

That's not what he's talking about. The risk we're concerned with is
not gear-up landing (which is, for all practical purposes, a financial
rather than a life-and-lib risk) but loss of control in IMC. Having
the gear hanging out means it takes that much longer to overspeed the
airplane, giving the pilot that much more time to recover from the
unusual attitude.

I agree, However, as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread, the
Cirrus is an extremely "clean" airplane even with its fixed gear. That's
how it achieves its exceptional cruise speed performance. On an airplane
like an Arrow you can extend the gear to greatly increase drag when things
get dicey. Obviously not an option in the Cirrus, but they could employ
spoilers or similar devices to achieve the same purpose.

--
-Elliott Drucker