I guess you have to gloss over the details when you become a salesman.  Maybe
an experienced builder can slap together a Lancair in 1000 hours.  I do know
that it takes me less than half the time to build the second flap, aileron,
wing, whatever, than the first one.  Building your second identical airplane
in 1000 hours with pre-made firewall forward, factory-wired panel, and farmed
out bodywork now becomes merely laughable, rather than preposterous.  Maybe
it's even possible, but I'm not sure I'd be comfortable saying that to a
prospective customer without all the disclaimers.  Not to mention names of
customers who have actually done it.

Myself, I've spent 1550 hours with a tool in one hand and an airplane part in
the other, and I'm only half done.  I've also paid for about 60 hours of
builder assistance, so my project has about 1600 hours invested in it.  God
only knows how many additional hours I've spent doodling at work, reading
construction manuals, analyzing this or that, driving to the hardware store,
etc.  Probably three times as much time as I've actually spent building.  And
I am NOT building a showplane, merely a solid and hopefully safe machine.  

On a different but related topic, I've spent about 20 hours doing Superfil on
the bottom of my fuselage.  No, I'm not done, but based on this limited
experience I don't see how even the most dedicated perfectionist could spend
1000 manhours on fill-and-paint.  Even if you could, why would you want to?  
But maybe you guys will let me park next to you anyway, since my airplane
will make yours look even better....

Having said all that, and probably having just pissed off 2/3 of the Lancair
community, I was amazed at how much farther along the Legacy was than the
"Super Fast Build" 360 I bought in 1994.  In fact, when I saw the Legacy at
Oshkosh for the first time, I realized that at 600 hours of build time, I was
only 100 or so hours away from getting to where the Legacy is when you open
the box!  So I do believe that build times have come down substantially.

My hat's off to you early non-fast-build kit builders.  

- Rob Wolf
LNC2 50% IO-360