Ok, good job, you both may be right. Smernsky, I did find what looks to be either a hairline crack or an abrasion, can't really tell with my 10X hand lens. I already had a ferrule wrap on the female section and the crack/abrasion disappears under or near it. Right now I'm going with abrasion. I have it marked and will do some casting and see if it extends.

You know that step-down in taper I mentioned in the first post? Well, it actually is a bump about 1.5" long starting about 2" in from the male tip. It expands about .006" and it is stopping the female from sliding all the way into position. So, kengore, I will have to try the fine tuning with the 1000/2000 paper. The blank wall thickness is about .025" so seems I should have enought blank to work with. We'll see.