Soo.... It flies!
It was a bit windy at the local RC field this morning, but I was tired of waiting. First couple tries resulted in nothing but really fast drives down the runway. It just wouldn't take off. Figured elevator was weak, and solved the takeoff issue by bending the rear landing gear forward so that the nose was raised up higher.
Before the flight I changed out my power pod. Figured it would be best to go lighter after the first couple failures so here's the new specs:
Turnigy Multistar 2213 935kv Motor - 55 gram 200 watt burst
Generic 20 Amp ESC
APC 10x4.7 Slow Fly Prop
1500mAh 3S 25C Lipo.
Moved CG back just a tad to the very leading edge of the top wing.
Completed Airframe Weight: 377 grams
AUW w/ Battery: 514 grams
All in all, I'm very happy with how the plane handled. Elevator was weak, soo weak I couldn't do a loop, but that shouldn't be hard to fix. It was very stable, even at the low speeds I was flying. I think the undercamber wing tips and the airfoil on the canard really help out there.
Roll rate, even though I didn't do a bunch of rolls will be very high. Rates need to go down on the ailerons a bit.
I think I am going to cross post this on RCGroups. I need some more input on Canard functions and physics. I want to know if there is anything I can do to get a more responsive elevator without just making things bigger. I worry about having the rear wings stall before the canard, or other bad things could happen if I simply increase size.
Once I do some tweaking and get another couple flights in I'll be posting Beta plans for anyone interested.