studentpilot wrote:

Know a bloke well with over 15'000 hours, he has had no engine failures.
He has had however 4 self inficted engine failures, these were fuel
system failures. Mostly failure to put enough in, failure to check
for water contamination properly, failure to know the aircraft fuel
system. This blokes expirence is all single engine, going from little
Lyc's to Radial's and turbine.

Why do you exclude fuel exhaustion, fuel contamination etc? Don't they
happen if you're IFR?

If you're IFR or at night it doesn't really matter WHY it stops.