hey guys, I have my uproar 40 with a 46ax. it flys great but I think its still nose heavy. When ever I roll it over inverted the nose of the plane wants to drop. If I dont correct it, It would be taking a dirt nap quickly. I herd thats a sign of being nose heavy. Is that correct? Thanks James.

A common way to check the CG is by flying inverted. The plane should generally require a little downward pressure (push) on the elevator. The nose of the plane should drop a little. Of course then there's tweaking out to fit the style of flying you want to do. Some 3D guys have the CG so far back that they don't need any elevator for inverted flight, or if you want very stable plane and don't fly inverted a lot you might want a forward CG.

Other things to do are to roll into a vertically banked turn and see if the nose drops. Also see what happens in knife edge flight. There are trim charts that outline all this, but it starts with the inverted flight routine. Can also be thrust angles, etc.

Yes, that's a symptom.

But you don't need to know anything more about the CG than you already know. Honest, the mfg's suggested CG is just a starting point, and you've made it past the start for sure.

There isn't anything magic about the CG. Ain't no magic one that works for all Uproar 40s. You know yours and how it flies with the present CG. And you know that moving it forward seems to be the thing to do to make it fly better. OK, move it some forward. No matter where the battery is now, moving it forward isn't going to create a monster. Chances are good with most models we've flown that moving the battery forward as far as possible would still be safe. So give it a shot.

Good thing about our hobby is that we can usually try something with very little effort. Moving the battery temporarily often is just a matter of some masking tape and 5 minutes. If it works, then we make the move permanent.

If the model's nose-heavy, then either remove a small amount of weight from the nose or add a small amount to the tail. You'll need to "play" with it to get it to handle as you like.

Another way to test the balance is to put the model in a 45-degree dive and release the controls. If it pulls out very rapidly, then you're 'way nose-heavy. If it pulls out gradually or not at all, you should be OK. If the dive tends to worsen, you're tail-heavy, and how fast is worsens tells you how much. Of course, if the model's too tail-heavy, it should be very quick in pitch and may be almost uncontrollable in pitch.