Slow or fast climb...what's quicker?

[jfrye01]

Hello..I have a question that has been bothering me for as long as I have been doing cross country flights...is it faster to climb up to cruising altitude at a higher climb rate, or is it faster to to slowly climb out at a higher airspeed? Does it make much difference? Obviously when leveled off you cruise faster, so I'm having some trouble figuring it out. Forgive me if this is a stupid question
Thanks!

 

[Jim Logajan]

At 65 knots, if the engine lost power, I have very little time to shove the nose down to avoid a stall.

Unless I'm misunderstanding the aerodynamics:

You're trimmed for 65 kts, so if you lose power the nose should come down of its own accord and the plane will descend at 65 kts. Should be no need to shove anything forward except mixture or whatever else might revive the engine.

If anything, you may need to pull back a bit more to slow to best glide because climb speed trim is probably a higher speed.

Perhaps what some pilots do wrong that puts them into a stall after engine out is trying to maintain aircraft attitude?