[dsraven]

good idea with the template. I have used posterboard before and also have used thin sheet metal as a contour guide too. the metal is less forgiving than the posterboard for sure. I make a posterboard template, ensure it fits perfect, then lay that out on the thin sheet metal and go from there. lots of times you can get thin sheet metal cheap from an outfit that does furnace replacements or does heating/ventilating duct work. actually, sometimes they make a mistake and have the leftover pieces kicking around and they sell them cheap because they were already written off and also because they are in the way. yep, they are galvanised, so not good for body panels necessarily, but great for templates etc. otherwise they have the used vent pipes that would normally go to the recycler.