If the plane is supposed to have incidence it is NORMALLY INDICATED ON THE PLANS.

For setting the incidence you will need an incidence meter. I use the Great Planes laser incidence meter.

How I set the plane up is:

For positive/negative incidence:

I block the plane up and use a small level on the horizontal stab to insure that this is level. Then I "zero out" the incidence guage on a level surface and clamp it to the main wing. At that point I adjust (shim ) the wing as needed to get the incidence I need.

For ARFS and other planes:

For ARFs and other planes with no incidence given, I assume it is a 0/0 incidence (0 incidence on the main wing and 0 incidence on the horizontal stab ). With these planes I zero out the incidence meter and clamp it to the main wing. Then I block the plane up until the incidence meter reads 0. Then using a small level, I make sure the horizontal stab is at 0 degrees.

The reason I do it differently for ARFs and other types of planes is that it is usually easier (less work ) to shim/adjust the horizontal stab than the main wing. I ALWAYS check the incidence on ARFs. While it is unusal, I have found a couple of ARFs that had positive/negative incidence, even though the manufacturer has stated that it should be a 0/0 incidence.

Hope this helps.