B727 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 210; Flight Crew Type 6500
Human-Machine Interface; Situational Awareness
Deviation - Speed All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence
Flight Crew Became Reoriented
Weather; Aircraft; Human Factors
Vectoring around weather in a 2nd generation B737. We got high and lowered the gear and went to flaps 15 to get down.  As we leveled off; the thrust was at idle. Airspeed was deteriorating rapidly. I called out airspeed; but the Captain didn't hear me (no intercom and noisy cockpit). Just then; we captured the Localizer. Aircraft banked 30 degrees to capture localizer and quickly pitched up approximately 15-20 degrees to maintain altitude. We both grabbed the yoke; disconnected autopilot; applied power; and recovered. It was surprising how quickly the aircraft pitched up. We don't fly B737 this version much. Situational awareness is degraded in the older generation B737s. The more comfortable we get with glass; the less comfortable we are with analog. How we communicate in the cockpit is different (that was big here); no autothrottles; and degraded SA.  I don't have the same comfort level in the older generation B737s as I do in the [glass cockpit B737's].
B737-300 First Officer reports getting very slow after using gear and flaps to get down; when the aircraft banks hard to capture the localizer and pitches up to capture altitude with the engines at idle and no autothrust.