Ditto what Kevin Horton said.

And last time the subject of Kitplanes came up on these forums, I badmouthed it, for what was good reason in my experience.

Under Marc's leadership, the magazine has changed and the articles are no longer an alternative form of advertising for it's advertisers.

I actually wish I had resubscribed a few months earlier.

Richard Scott

I enjoyed the engine monitor articles this month. but I wish they'd been more of a critical review to help me decide what to look for in engine monitors. And a price comparison where some prices included probes and some didn't (and I don't know what probes cost) didn't help me much in that category.

In fact, I'm befuddled by the price you have listed for the Grand Rapids EIS-4000 ($995). Why is it so much less than the others?

I enjoy the mag, though I think not having online access for print subscribers is weird.

Also, rather than put in the print edition "for links to the products" go to kitplanes.com, why not just put the URL for the product in the article somewhere.

Bob:

Excellent points, thanks.

I wish we could do much more in-depth coverage in stories like this, but it's difficult without a lot of actual flight experience with the units. In fact, the very best way to test engine monitors would be to have them all in the same airplane at the same time, and compare features and functions in real time. That's not really feasible, so the next best thing would be having them installed in the same airplane serially, also a daunting task and one that could take so much time as to be irrelevant by the time the matrix is completed because the technology marches on.

The remaining options, as I see them, are:

1. Knock off the reviews one by one, including some long-term stories such as the one Dan did on his Dynon D10. (And that's great from a longevity standpoint, but getting close to irrelevant in terms of features, as his is a straight 10, and the D10A that I now have as a backup does a lot more.) I have, for example, 180 hours with a Dynon D100/D120 combo so I could easly evaluate in detail. I'm looking forward to getting more time with the new AFS units as well.

2. Ask for outside reviews of particular units. This is workable, but the writing skills and critical acumen of builders is all over the map. How do we know if we're getting an honest and representative evaluation? (I knew we'd get one from Dan because he's a reasonable, thoughtful guy.)

3. Conduct a user survey. Find out from owners who have certain units what they like and dislike about them. I think I prefer this tactic because it tends to average out responses that are highly critical or overly fawning. I think I like this angle the best.

I agree that not listing the probe prices hurt the utility of the table, but I tried it with all the permutations and had to make it in 4-point type. I suppose we could have included a magnifying glass in that issue...

Online access is an interesting issue. I've been lobbying to get subscribers access for free or a greatly reduced price for some time. I think I'm making headway...

Hope this helps.

--Marc

Anecdotal stories of products (a single article on a product), as Dan did with the Dynon are always interesting to me but that's just me, of course. Still, that's what I like about your series on the Sportsman. It focuses on your choices and what the consequences are and the advantages and things you'd do differently of course.

Don't get me wrong, the article was helpful to me as an introduction to engine monitors. Very helpful. To the point where I'm anxious to learn more.

Being in the online news business, I feel for you on the Web site stuff. I think the answer is probably setting up some sort of premium content section for ADDITIONAL content to enhance the dead-tree version. How exactly to do that, however, escapes me at the moment.

Keep up the good work.

B

To get "Consumer Reports" style side-by-side comparisons requires Consumer Reports style budgets - which I doubt would be obtainable. I really do like the idea of the satisfaction survey though. You could devote a page a month to various specific surveys, then post or print the results some months later after a good number of responses come in.

I get a lot of aviation magazines, but as an Experimental flyer this is the very best in my opinion for my Experimental world. Even EAA doesn't have the same value for what I need to learn and understand for operating, modifying and maintaining my aircraft (which is a sad commentary on the EAA). When I recently lost an issue that had important articles I needed, Marc replaced the data within hours of a request - what more could you possibly ask for in a key source of information for your passion? :D
Great magazine and great resource for our Experimental world.
Thank you Marc. Keep up the great work.
DV