WEll, after making the changes I listed above, and more - the thing is flying reasonably well.

My theory was that the canard was working to hard at too much angle of attack, causing way too much drag. I removed the nose weight, un-pitched the canard, and added some "up" to the elevons. That seems to have helped alot. The climb is better and it comes around the turns better and goes faster. I still need to keep full throttle for just about the whole flight. It will now do an egg-shaped loop from fast flight.

Speaking of fast flight, I noticed a strange "tuck" when it gets going fast. That, is it seemed to loose it's tendency to return to it's trimmed speed from a dive, and actually wanted to steepen the dive. I think this is partially from the free play in the little pushwire they give you for the canard. I replaced this with a 2-56 pushrod and nylon clevis, and the "tuck" is much reduced.

Flying full throttle so much I made some cooling mods as well. After the initial flights the motor was too hot to touch for more than a second and the battery was uncomfortably hot. THe plywood motor mount they give you blocks most of the vent area in the case of the motor. A friend noticed this and spent 5 minutes opening up those vents. I also decided to vent the battery area as well. I melted a small hole into the fuselage cavity near where the fake "inlets" would be on this plane. I then used a soldering gun to cut pencil sized channels in the foam next to the battery pack- to expose the pack sides to cool air instead of insulation. Also, I cut a tapered hole in the battery hatch shaped so that it would suck air out from behind the battery. These changes have definitely cooled the equip. I can easily hold the motor when it lands and the pack temp is down by some amount measured in tens of degrees.

It is still plenty stable, as it recovers straight ahead and levels easily from "cobra"stalls and still won't nearly stall in level flight. So, I think I will be shifting the CG another 1/4" rearward and see how that does.

The strange twitchiness in roll is gone, since I taped the LE. I also replaced the elevons with ones made out of 1/4" foamboard/posterboard. The 1/4 thick styrofoam seemed just a little too twisty for a long skinny aileron. It rolls like a tire going downhill now.

Then next thing I will do is try a Nimh 950 battery in place of the 1100 Nicad I have now. The savings of almost 4 oz should make up for the slight capacity difference. Hopefullly it will allow better full power climb, and a reduction in throttle for level flight.