I've only had OS engines and one cheap chinese made engine just to see what it was like. For me, i want to get into the air as quickly as possible. There was nothing more frustrating than driving 30 mins to get to the field and then not have your engine run correctly and dead stick each landing. I've decided I'll pay the premium for an O.S. going forward. I'm not saying that ST engines will be like my experience. But I'll pay the premium for something that will be easy to tune and gets me into the air quicker than anything else, especially given my very limited available time to fly.

Once my kid is out of the house or I'm retired and I have unlimited time to play with this hobby, I definitely intend to try out some other engine brands.