Dick wasn't excited about the engine choice I made with his liable hat on. But off the record he told me that Tracy Crook was on to something and that he enjoyed flying a rotary powered motor glider. He just couldn't condone it with his agreement with the Lycosaurus people in his back pocket. I understood. He said that he didn't want to have my aircraft associated with his line of Kits. Well I told him that I wouldn't call it an RV-6.  

That's interesting Doug.  I've never known Van's to care about what engine you use, but maybe that has all changed since you went through this.  They were only too happy to sell me parts, including a new set of gear legs that were shipped directly to Fred, for use on the rotary engine mount.  Everyone I talked to at Van's seemed interested in the rotary engine, but maybe just because it wasn't the same old conversation they had with builders all day.  

One thing you might want to consider is insurance.  It's hard enough to get for a rotary engine plane that's on the insurance list of approved models, but when you present them with a one-off model name, you may be out of luck.  I wouldn't personally change the name just because you changed the engine.  It's still an RV-6 unless you made some major structural changes.  

I've been in insurance hell for the last week or so.  Avemco is the only company who will insure the single rotor powered Kolb Slingshot, but their crappy $100k sub-limits won't satisfy the county's $300k hanger lease requirement.  Some companies will happily insure the engine, but they don't insure light pusher type planes like the Kolb.  Other companies are happy to insure the Kolb, but not with a one-off engine.  I'm going to ask some questions about "premise" coverage today, and then decide it it's worth having two policies for close to $2k per year, just to put the single rotor on the Kolb.  With the HKS, I can get one better policy, and only pay about $500/yr.  I could easily insure the single rotor on something like a Zenith CH601XL.  Just maddening.

Cheers,

Rusty (Philip's loves conference calls, off to one now)