I would encourage anyone interested in learning about my experience to email or PM me. I purchased the S-LSA featured in this video this past April:
http://www.bydanjohnson.com/index.cfm?b=6&m=5&id=327.
I chose this particular airplane for two reasons: 1. It was already on the East Coast (was featured at Sebring airshow and Sun N Fun) 2. It has the Garmin G3X touch. Also has a unique feature in that a Garmin Nuvi camera can be mounted at the tail tie down ring and connected directly to the G3X screen.
I added a second G3X touch screen - Vic Syracuse installed the kit from Van's for me - it was truly "plug and play". Other than the panel fitting/change and plugging in the cable (already in the harness), the only other change was upgrading the fuse for avionics from 5 amps to 7.5.
I have put just over 30 hours on the plane so far and absolutely love it. I flew 2 hours cross country just yesterday. The Garmin system has been flawless and has quite a few features that I absolutely love. The autopilot is incredibly easy to use: with the touch screen and the GMC305 controller, it's easy to set up to capture heading (or nav track), vertical speed or indicated airspeed, level off at pre-selected altitude, and then (using VNAV) automatically descend to pattern altitude. Of course I don't let it do all the flying...
Hand flying is very intuitive, and very responsive - good climb rate, great "feel", fast roll rate, easy to land (understanding the sensitivity of LSA to gusts - just requires attention to stick and rudder when landing). Slowing down to flap speed and descending to the pattern takes some attention - this airplane wants to stay in the air. Speed control on final is very important - over 60kts and it floats...
I'm getting TAS of 116-117 knots at 5400 RPM around 6000 feet, burning about 4.9-5 gph.
Van's has been very responsive to questions and other requests but the only real issue I have had is the Rotax carb floats - mine have been fine but have waited until last week for the new ones. I'm going to take it down to Lockwood week after next to have the new ones installed, and a scheduled oil change.
Build quality is superb, as is the paint job. I've compared to a few other RV-12's and find the quality to be better than most and equal to some of the best homebuilders.
Turner Billingsley