The consensus may be that EASA is more out of touch than the FAA but I can assure that the FAA is also full of people who, for lack of a better term, haven't a clue. When I started in the business almost 40 years ago, field approved modifications were way more common than STC'ed approvals. I'm not aware of whether or not that is or has ever been an option under EASA, where a local FSDO inspector could approve a proposed modification and often times even would allow a previous field approval to substantiate the same repair/alteration on another airframe of the same type. You could actually go to their office and explain/argue your case. They had the option to reject or put you off while they researched it or stamp it on the spot. Were there approvals that never should have been approved? Yup, however not as many as one might think. Maybe I'm lucky nothing I did ever came back to bite me and there were a few oddball things I did on fixed wing machines that would never be approved in any way today. One that comes to mind is bolting 2 over-engineered pieces of steel on a Hamilton Standard propeller hub on a P & W 985 to allow for placement of balance weights for dynamic balancing (other than the hollow Welch bolts that hold the hub halves together). I had a Chadwick and made a handful of those engines run as so smoothly that the ag operator thought I was a god. The FAA field approved it but eventually came to their senses and said "no more". As far as I know they are still flying. Too many of the FAA inspectors have been brought up through the ranks being told "why take the risk"? Now field approvals are not nearly as easy to obtain. I'm waiting for external load devices to eventually fall under the FAA purview so that Bambi buckets, helitorches, hydraulic chainsaws, SAR equipment not to mention long lines themselves will to have their stamp of approval. It is all complicated by the fact that in IMO the FAA lacks having many people who are helicopter savvy and are willing to allow that many operators are quite capable of knowing what is safe and works for what they do. Too bad , too sad.