I think if you want the safety and assuredness of testing that a
certified engine has, then fly behind one-in a nice certified airframe
that you can buy cheaper than building a homebuilt. A structural
inflight failure will get you killed far more reliably than an engine
failure. If you are opposed to experimenting, you shouldn't be in
experimental aviation.

It would be exceedingly rare for any pilot with many thousands of
hours experience, like myself, to endorse your warped & cavalier view.

Ever wonder why?

Steve Wittman and Dave Blanton both flew auto engines very
successfully for a lot of hours, both being past middle age when they
started with thousands of flight hours. Steve was killed with his much
younger wife behind a Lycoming-although there's no evidence it was
anything to do with the engine, indeed, it's a mystery to this day-and
Dave died of old age. They were both _experimenters_, but safe and
methodical ones, the kind that made aviation in the first place and
then experimental sport aviation possible.

I stand by my view, that BoB is basically an old buzzard with a big
mouth, so to speak (or type.) A lot of people shouldn't work on or
attempt to build anything that flies, or anything else. For people
with a desire to advance the art, study what has and hasn't worked-and
why-and then set out to build a better mousetrap, they in my opinion
are the reason why Congress has seen fit to allow FAA to keep
Experimental Amateur Built activity as it is. Sure, people get
killed-usually not famous, occasionally a John Denver-and people bitch
saying "there ought to be a law". Type certification, right or wrong,
is there for a reason and Experimental aviation outside the Amateur
Built category is regulated pretty heavily. Ask the CJAA guys if you
dispute this. As Dave Blanton said to me when I would go off on how we
needed to get a libertarian-minded government, homebuilding existed
partly because old and wise people in government itself (at that time)
knew over-regulation would cause a backlash and stop progress. As long
as Poberezny's EAA behaved like adults-and they did-the FAA would let
them play in their own sandbox.

In case y'all hadn't noticed, the amateur-built tail is wagging the
General Aviation dog now. The popularity of certain designs with 3000
flying or in progress is making many people think people are building
to get around type certification instead of because they like building
and want to learn. A lot of these airplanes are being built by "serial
builders", some of whom are A&Ps who quit work to play in their
garage.

With most aircraft being built strictly to plans with certified
engines and often by people who are not amateurs, no one experimenting
in any fashion anymore, the case for not making them get a type
certificate is getting weaker. This is like ham radio, which used to
be how electronics people learned their trade-building transmitters.
Now there's no more electronics industry, hams buy everything off the
shelf, and Amateur Radio is going to lose their spectrum, starting
with HF as the broadband-over-powerline crowd craps the band up.

Don't bitch at me-I'm just the messenger. If you **** on people for
wanting to make progress, and no one does, and the FAA kicks you out
of your sandbox because you have no leverage (post your Ayn Rand
arguments of right to alt.politics.libertarian, I deal in reality), I
don't want to hear it.