Yes, my friend . the instructions are not just bad. Its a shame that an excellent Chinese man-work and very good materials are minimized with an excel or power point job.
Your right , the chrome rod goes just in front of engine like a support to avoid wing spin.

The additional weight in this plane, in my opinion, its critical. It need a lot of dead weight to get the balance. I read that the canards are balanced with a fill tank because when you spend the fuel the airplane wins nose weight, That is such much better for a better control in flight.
And for the last question, yes the elevator its the opposites of the other airplanes , when the elevator goes up the nose goes down.

Another adjustment that i had to do it , its to cut a lot of nose gear rod to have a negative thrust, so the plane cans run more distance in the track and get more speed , before take off, that to avoid a poor friction in nose wheel. The plane nose was to high and could be a problem on take off or touch down without the rudders.

Julio