Thread: "бывалый" против "опытный"

In fact, "бывалый" has nothing to do with the age. Although it's hard to imagine a young person who "бывалый" is, it can be in some cases.
Valda, "опытный" is more specific word, it usually implies a set of the characteristics, specified by the context. Like "опытный врач", "опытный водитель" or "опытный любовник". It means that a person is high-skill in something, experienced.
"Бывалый" specifies a person in general. It's still a characteristic of experience, but it more says that a person "knows life". For example, "бывалый водитель" implies that a driver saw a lot of different situations, troubles, accidents etc, s/he can solve problems with a car because it's an ordinary thing for them, knows a lot of stories and so on. When we say "бывалый" we usually imagine a "weather-beaten" man (or object). So, you can say "бывалый самолет" or "бывалая машина", for example. It means that a car can "tell" you a lot and usually the car looks crappy. But you can't say "опытная машина" (first, because a car can't have skills, second, actually it means "experimental car/machine", so "опытный" also can be "experimental").
I hope it helps.

http://www.ozhegov.org/

This is a link to Ozhegov's dictionary that explains the meanings of words and illustrates their usage in modern Russian. Enjoy!

And how would you translate the name of the Jimi Hendrix song "Are you experienced" into Russian?