IMHO, any Lancair (high performance) at a minimum should have a traditional Altimeter, Airspeed Indicator, Artificial Horizon, Turn Coordinator (W/ Skid Slip), Clock/Timer and Localizer Glideslope all TSOed and all within your scan as backups to any experimental EFIS system. You should be able to pass your ICC WITHOUT your primary system. If you can't then what the f%$k good is your standby?

I have been participating on this list for eight years now and find just about anything Brent Regan and Hamid Wasti say about instruments, electrical systems, instrument and EFIS certification worth taking to the bank. Likewise, there are a few others in this forum worth listening to, also.

 

IMHO, the worst panels I have seen and flown behind in the Lancair group have been "designed" by the novice owner/pilot who has very little "hard IFR" (that California term again 'cause IMC is hard everywhere else) experience. This is not the place for a novice to display his or her "talent" or lack of it.

 

Some rules to live by in the Lancair:

 

1. The EFIS will fail IMC

2. You will have a total electrical failure IMC

3. Your AHARS will crap out in night/ IMC

4. Your autopilot will go ape shit in IMC causing you to believe 1 or 3 have happened.

5. If you do not believe any of this can happen in your airplane because you "designed" it then you have a fool for a designer.

 

Brent is correct about the backups... take them very seriously. They will save your bacon. If you cannot pass an IPC with just the backups working then you should not be flying IMC IMHO.

 

Jeff