"CFLav8r" wrote
My question is about the aircraft not the ability to fly it in IFR
conditions.

Your answers are to be found in the operating limitations for the
aircraft in question. Standard operating limitations for experimental
amateur-built aircraft are give in FAA Order 8130.2d, Change 2. While
the inspector issuing the certificate has some discretion, generally
they are issued as written. I call attention to the following:

Page 112, Par 134, line item 8: After completion of Phase I flight
testing, unless appropriately equipped for night and/or instrument
flight in accordance with 91.205, this aircraft is to be operated
under VFR, day only.

So after Phase I, if you have the right equipment, you may indeed fly
IFR.

I recently showed my instructor an ad for a Glasair and he remarked that
you could never get it IFR certified with the FAA.

Well, you couldn't get a Glasair certified in any way - VFR or IFR.
It does not meet the requirements of Part 23. That does not mean you
can't operate it under IFR.

When people talk about an airplane being IFR certified, they are
usually talking about the seminannual pitot/static and transponder
checks required by 14CFR91.411 and 14CFR91.413, which is performed by
an instrument shop, not the FAA. If that is the 'certification' he is
talking about, then he is simply wrong.

That didn't make much sense to me, but then again I am the student and he
is the instructor.

Just because someone has a CFI ticket doesn't mean he necessarily
knows anything. It's just a piece of paper issued by some federal
bureaucrat.

The way I figure it, if it is IFR equipped then why couldn't it be IFR
certified?

See above. If you mean certified under Part 23, plenty of reasons
having to do with stall speed, stability, lack of lightning
protection, etc. If you mean certified by a technician to meet the
requirements of 91.411 and 91.413, then no reason at all.

Michael