I finally bit the bullet today and re-bent the front tube frame. I was able to get a perfect match this time, and started drilling the skin to the frame itself. I scrapped the first tube after it just didn't fit. You can see in the pic below that it's too short. "Where's that tube stretcher when you need it?" It was also the wrong curve. There must have been some mismeasurement in the making of the first bending jig. The way to do this is to find the center point and wrap the tube around the jig. There will be a lot of springback, but you can use a standard tubing bender to tweak it. Lay the tube next to the frame, and where it starts to move away from the jig, mark it and do a little tweaking. Take your time. I also trimmed the front of the skin to its final size. The small bulges that I was sweating immediately disappeared with the extra metal gone. Whew. Good news. I plan to finish up the tube frame drilling tomorrow and may get as far as locating the l-angle stiffeners for the turtledeck.
