I just got finished building my Lightening and per Ray Labonte no need for the hinges. Also he said the CG is on the leading edge of the wing tube socket without the wings on.you put a wooden dowel under the fuselage to balance.That's how i set mine up and it was perfect. The 1/8 " light ply shaped like a bullet gets mounted in the nose cone area. There is nothing in the manual how to do it so i used aluminumn angel to mount it to the front former. since i was going to use this plate for all my batteries it needed support on the leading edge of the plywood so i drilled a small hole on the end of the nose cone and epoxied a tapered block in the cone. Then i mounted a small block on the very end of the 1/8 plate with a blind nut on the backside for a allen head bolt to thread into. This kept the plate from bouncing around inside the cone and made it a lot easier to access the batterys. Hope this helps some. Mel