[seattle smitty]

Those are good, valid thoughts, Brian. Here are a few more:

I resent owning an engine (or anything) that I am legally discouraged from opening up and maintaining, repairing, or modifying as I choose. As long as the aircraft says Experimental on the side, and family and passengers are made to understand what that means, I think I should be able to feel free to work on any part of it.

I resent paying huge sums for an engine which doesn't merit huge sums, especially when the huge sums are largely related directly and indirectly to the activities of lawyers. I detest lawyers, who produce nothing, contribute little, and whose enormous influence impairs many activities that interest me. You all have seen those descriptions of how many months a year each of us is working for the government rather than for ourselves. I would like to see a similar figure arrived at for how many months we work for the lawyers, either directly or because of the influence of their wretched trade. In fact, much of what goes to the government is actually due to industrious lawyers, not politicians.

If Ferrari wanted to build an engine which would repeatedly and reliably maintain full climb power to maximum altitude, they could certainly do so. It might take them two tries to get to the engine we'd want. It's too bad Porsche only made one try, because their "B model" surely would have been a good one. But they probably tired of dealing with the ramifications of our legal system. Maybe somebody here knows the whole story. I know that such masterful engine makers as Yamaha have looked at aircraft engines, considered the legal exposure, and said, "Forget THAT!!"

If Lycoming, Continental, and other traditional aircraft engine suppliers were not constrained by the costs of meeting FAA requirements, and if the FAA could base its requirements soley on practical issues, and if both manuufacturers and FAA were not having to cower beneath the ever-looming specter of lawsuit-hell, new engines from those companies would be better than they are now and much cheaper.

Aircraft engines are built to do a job and avoid lawsuit-hell. Automotive engines are built to do a (different) job and be cheap. But auto engines are raced, so parts and techniques are available to upgrade their reliability, efficiency, and suitability for aircraft use. They still might not be ideal, but can be plenty good enough, especially since the certified aircraft engines aren't ideal, either.

Water cooling systems add weight. But air cooling fins weigh more than water jacketing, so the real final weight difference isn't as much as some think. The opposed-cylinders ("boxer") layout is the lightest weight configuration for a piston engine. But they still sound bad to me . . . .