Dennis...I cut a hole into the top portion of the firewall so that airflow from the cowl goes over the battery, and then I cut a cooling air exit behind the canopy on the bottom of the fuselage. For battery installation, I cut a small hatch between the cowl and the front of the canopy. this makes battery changes fast and easy to do.
Re the venus 2....I don't know what happened, but the fellow who covered my model must have been hung over or something when he did it...I have spent over 3 hours trying to get all the wrinkles out of it so far....almost 2 hours on the fuselage alone.....it's almost to the point where it's easier to remove the covering and start from scratch...it must be just this model, because I have never seen one this poorly covered before...my little Venus was far superior to this one in the covering department. almost no wrinkles in it. Once the covering is straightened out, I will get weights together.
Ailerons were both slightly twisted, so I spent a little time straightening them out...This though, I have found to be a common occurrence with inexpensive ARF models, so I expected as much before I bought the model, and they are easy to straighten....I am contemplating the front hatch method for batteries again, but will need to install the motor and gear first so that I can check the balance point, but this looks like a good option. as it gives lots of room to slide the pack fore and aft to adjust the CG. I was very surprised at how far rearward the batteries had to go on the little Venus, and am pretty sure this is going to be roughly the same. other than the covering, it looks fairly well done.....so far.