You still need A&P supervision on a homebuilt! The FAA designated examiner who periodically inspects your work during the build is also an A&P/IA, and you will require his signoff before first flight.
Having the aircraft inspected is different than being supervised. The inspection is after the fact. Supervision means that someone is eyes on as you are building. Homebuilding requires only inspection, not supervision.
[quote] Afterwards, while you might perform any maintenance on your homebuilt and signoff any logs yourself, you'll still need a repairman's certificate good only for your plane, requiring documentation acceptable to the FAA that you built 51% of the plane.
If you built less than 51% (after buying someone's partially completed project, for instance), you don't get the repairman's certificate, and an A&P still has to do all the signoffs. I also believe the annual re-certification inspection still needs an A&P signoff, regardless (somebody correct me if I'm wrong here). I believe there are also certain operational restrictions with homebuilts that aircraft built under a production authorization don't have, such as airspace where they CAN'T be flown (again, I may be wrong).
Nobody clearly understands the FAA (even the FAA) but there is reasoning behind most of the madness!
