Rather than use water to bend the balsa, I have started using pure ammonia in a spray bottle. It seems to work much better, and the wood holds it shape real well afer it dries. It smells like h*ll, but it seems to work much better than just plain water. I too had problems with the sheeting on my SE, and on the canopy hatch, I ended up going to the LHS and finding a sheet of more flexible balsa than was supplied in the kit. You can see pics of my "mess" on the thread below, and how it looked after it was finished. Took a lot of sanding, but came out ok in the end. (It's post #7)

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_19...tm.htm#1914644