Does it make sense to balance a plane with a half tank of fuel ? To me it does so you won't be so nose heavy at the begining and will only be a little tail heavy at the end since you never completly burn all of the fuel .

Always balance a plane in it's most tail heavy possible configuration, as that will set the worst possible case.

For most planes, that means ballancing with the tank empty. For pusher configurations (engine in back) that would be tank full.

very nose heavy planes fly poorly, but tail heavy planes only fly once. You could surprise yourself one day, be ready to land with your usual 1/3rd tank left when someone plows their plane in on the runway, littering it with pieces. Now you've gotta stay up until the debris is cleared, and you really dont' want to be fighting a progressively more tail heavy plane! Especially with ppl on the runway, cleanin up for ya!

J

Never Ever balance a plane with fuel in the tank except only one rare condition. If your tank is behind the center of gravity balance with a full tank, other than that NO, the fuel tank should be completely empty.

I appreciate the info thanks .

I got to watch a guy fly a trainer that was tail heavy once. And I do mean once. I will give him credit because he managed to drive it straight into the ground without hitting anything else in a one mile range. I can not even try to explaine how it looked in the air once it lifted off.