When I first investigated building a Kitfox I talked to as many people that owned or built Kitfoxes that I could find.

That amounted to several dozen people. In my discussions the powerplant options always seemed to be a part of those discussions.

I was biased against using any kind of engine that required a gear box or speed reduction. I thought the extra complexity compared to a direct drive engine was a reliability issue.

But after talking to Kitfox owners and doing a fair amount of reading and talking to other people like Lockwood, Rotech, Lycoming and a few others I began to hear great things about the reliability of the Rotax series 9 engines.

I looked at aircraft sales and saw the Rotax installed Kitfoxes were getting better sales prices than some other engine combinations.

The short of the long story for me was that I completely changed my bias against Rotax engines and there we several things that did it for me, but the reliability, technical experience factor of Rotax manufacturer, power to weight ratio and the resale value were big hitters for me.

Now not everything is perfect about Rotax. One of those is price. They are very expensive. A lot to do with that is the weak US dollar. But recognize most things to do with airplanes are expensive, but there are other power options for the kitfox that are less expensive than the Rotax if you are just comparing acqusition price.

But I tried to look at the whole value proposition associated with the purchase of a Rotax engine and when I did that I came to a conclusion that Rotax was a better choice for me.

There are specific things you need to do to take care of the engine but it has been strong and reliable for me and I am happy with the choice.