Khodges,
I'm glad to see you chose to pursue "true-scaling" your Birddog. It's well worth the effort and it's something you can be quite proud of. The Mylar you refer to as expensive is far from it. In fact, it's less expensive when one considers the time necessary to glue, sand, fill and sand balsa sheeting. It's also substantially lighter and can be bent around things like the leading edge without cracking along the grain. Solid leading edges are fine for running into things but we're building an airplane, not a bumper car. Obviously, it's a labor of love but I still like to make short work of whatever I do. Mylar skinning allows more time for detailing and that's the area that really makes a "scale" model standout from the "sorta-scale" renditions. Your fear of punching your fingers through your wings is unfounded...try putting your finger through a material with 32,000 psi as opposed to 2890 psi and you'll understand the folly of that statement. Also, Mylar can be glued on in panels, per the full scale aircraft, so the panel lines are already there, not just grooves in overly thick filler. (READ: LIGHTER!) If I was you, I'd take a paper punch to all those solid wing ribs. It's possible to trim up to 40% of the weight of your ribs with judiciously punched holes. Try it on a scrap piece of balsa and weigh it...you'll be surprised how little strength you lose for the lightness you gain. I hole all my structural members, (JUST LIKE THE REAL ONES!) and I've yet to have a failure due to the holes. Now, that said, when you crash, all bets are off. If it can survive a crash you built it too heavy which is probably why it crashed in the first place. Airplanes should be designed for flying, not crashing. We're supposed to be competent enough when we get into building scale models that we don't build them with crashworthiness as a priority. Trainers are for crashing. I'm interested in seeing what your realized RTF weight is. Per the LG, solder up some music wire units...this type of gear construction has served modellers well for the past 60 years, at least. The LG can be scale, dimensionally, as well as in function...far better than aluminum and easier than FRP.

Nice Job! I hope I provided some inspiration for your efforts.