I agree with both Don and Stein.
Travleing in my RV-10 is:
Left Seat: Me
Right Seat: My Wife
Right Rear: My Son
Left Rear: My other kiddo (type unknown) due to arrive in June.
There's some serious cargo on that flight and there is nothing wrong with a little redundancy. I (like many RV-10 pilots) am rated for IFR flight, choose to avoid it, and won't challenge it if it's hard IFR. I've been inside enough hard IFR to know it's no place I want to be - especially single pilot. But experience tells me that at some critical points in the life of this airplane, I'm going to get caught in a weather (or equipment failure) situation where I could use added capability. I will have it at my finger tips. The stress levels in the cockpit go down, the family-enjoyment factor of flying goes up, and I'm reducing the risk my wife and kids are exposed to. I'm okay with all of that.
A little planning and design work on the ground can significantly reduce risk at a nominal cost. If it cost an incremental 20K-70K for added redundancy, I'm okay with paying it. While some folks would give their wife away
, I wouldn't. I couldn't name a price for my family because there isn't one I'd accept. Not even $70K.
Back to the spreadsheet I put together, if you can find more than 160K to build an RV-10, you can find the extra money to finish a nice panel. For me, if I'm spending that kind of money, I'm not going to cut corners and end up with something less than desirable. I'll find the extra 10-20% to finish off my airplane nicely.
Like I said before, the mission of the RV-10 is completely different from the typical RV. Sometimes I wonder if Van regrets designing airplane because it resonated with a non-traditional crowd and they're using it as a Cirrus, Lancair, or Corvalis would be used. And the builders are typically a separate crowd from the two-seat RV crowd. The RV-10 is the black sheep of Van's family and it'll never make sense to the traditional two-seat crowd. Excluding his bank account, I wonder if that bugs Van, if it caught him by surprise, or if it's something he planned on all along.
Phil