Kent,
First, congratulations!
Second, let's talk about degrees of separation. Yesterday, I allowed myself the 5 minutes or so of lurking on Doug's site. I saw the post of your beautiful RV7A making it's maiden voyage and thought "well good on him!" I also noticed that you mentioned 8.5 years....I then went on with my day.
Later that afternoon I was speaking on the phone long distance with one of the folks I work with on a regular basis, and after working through some issues he comes back at me with "so, are you still flying?" I answer that yes, I am and went on to describe my latest exploits, no doubt boring him to death, when he blurts out, "you know, my neighbor just flew a plane he built this past weekend. It took him eight and half years!'
To which I replied...."oh yeah, that's Kent Stent."
Very, very, very long pause............
Anyway, Bill Lucenta was thrilled you got to finally fly it. As am I

.