<< After a month or so of flying the plane the owner was
practicing "power-out landings."  I personally would question why one
would
practice this as I expect the plane flys like a brick with gear down
and no
power.>>
Gary,
Your S-51 example happens to be the one case where using an AOA
indicator can actually get you into trouble.  Flying the same AOA on
approaches works great if the descent rate and angle are always the same
or at least similar.  If for example you always fly ILS's like the
airlines or do nothing but carrier landings, your approaches will all
have a similar profile.  On the opposite side of the spectrum you have
our planes that can fly the ILS at 500 fpm or do a short approach at
1900 fpm.  If you fly both approaches at the same AOA you will far less
margin for arresting the high descent rate of the short approach.  In
the S-51, case the pilot needed to keep extra energy in the bank in the
form of higher airspeed and lower AOA than for his normal approaches.
'Got too slow' in this case could mean that he used the same airspeed
and AOA that he had always used in the past.  For the sake of
proficiency, I would hope that everyone has done power off landings all
the way to touch down.
Chris Zavatson