Mike Rapoport wrote:
The question is: Can (should) I rely completely on the (single) electrical
system in my home built airplane?

Yes, that is a good question to ask. However, if you have an alternator
failure warning light, you still have 30+ minutes of energy in the
battery, depending on battery size and how much load you can shed given
the conditions. I had a failure flying IFR into OSH several years ago
and flew the last 30 minutes mostly in IMC with one nav/com, the
transponder and my GPS. Still had enough juice to almost lower the
flaps for landing. :-)

So, there is a little bit of redundancy electrically. Contrast that to
the vacuum system where the only stored energy is what is in the gyros.
This typically is minutes at most. I had a precise flight standby
system in my Skylane which worked OK if you kept the manifold pressure
fairly low. However, enter a climb and you were toast.

I'm not sure what engine you have in mind for the Moose, but can you get
one with two alternator pads?


Matt