RE: Pitch and Efficiency
The term for the difference between how far forward the prop WANTS to pull the airplane in one revolution and how far forward the aircraft actually gets is the "Slippage factor."
This is not a constant for any prop, any airplane or any engine... because it varys with too many things. If you simply increase throttle from 60% to 65%, the slippage factor will increase. If you go from level flight to a climb, slippage increases. If you dive slippage can decrease and may become negative. (the airplane can be pushing the propeller.)
Slow flying FF models of the 1930's to 1940's expected a 50% slippage factor durring thier climb. (and it was far from a vertical climb as seen with modern FF competition models)
The modern FAI Pylon racers would be severely dissapointed to have a 15% slippage factor in level flight... That would indicate they had not properly streamlined the model somewhere. (or there was some other setup error...)
As to the airfoil effect on a prop's thrust... you can easilly demonstrate that it exists. Put a prop in a phillips screwdriver as if that were the engine crankshaft. Point the front of the prop into the wind and let the prop windmill. If the wind speed is above 10 mph, a 10X6 prop will pull itself into the wind, and off the screwdriver. The problem is... its a very difficult factor to quantify. Different propeller designs will be more effective at this than others of the same diameter and pitch. ( A 10X6 APC will "climb" off the screewdriver more rapidly than a Zinger 10X6 wood prop even though the APC takes longer to get to the same rpm...)