Standing outside the plush Piedmont-Hawthorn FBO at Lakeland’s Linder municipal airport, the Adam A-500 dominated the parking ramp.Indeed, as I walked out to the A-500 my initial impression was of the aircraft’s unique looks – it really does look great. The sheer size of the A-500 (it’s almost ten feet tall) combined with its futuristic styling made it easily the most distinctive aeroplane on a ramp crowded with dozens of other types of aircraft,including jets. The smooth,flowing lines, distinctive twin-boom tail and unusual fore-and-aft engine arrangement means that like it, love it or loathe it,the one thing you can’t do is ignore it. Personally, I like its distinctive looks. In a world where it is increasingly difficult to tell an Airbus from a Boeing,or a Lexus from a Mercedes, it made a pleasant change to evaluate such an individual design. As I drew nearer it became apparent that this machine is still in the development stage – not only is the word ‘Experimental’ written large on the side, but a small set of steps currently provides egress to the cabin as the airstair door is not yet fitted. Interestingly, although this was clearly a pre-production example I thought the standard of finish extremely high. Composites are used extensively (primarily Toray, a new type of pre-impregnated woven carbon fabric material) and their use has allowed Adam’s designers to create an airframe that is almost sculptured. Using this material has produced other advantages:for example, there are several major structural components that are pro- duced as single cure parts. Fur thermore, the outboard wings, horizontal tail and tailbooms have few secondary bonds in their primary structure.This allows for a lighter, stronger and safer construction, due to the reduction of fasteners and secondary bonds. All control surfaces are aluminium. During the walk-round I also approved of the beefy-looking trailing-link undercarriage, although perhaps the biggest surprise was to find that no cowl flaps appeared to be fitted.