the best way to push in tubing

[Captain Awesome]

A cheap way is to get a threaded rod (sized to fit dropout opening) with some nuts to fit on the rod,from hardware store or from Home Depot. spin on 2 nuts on the threaded rod, enough that they are within the dropouts. now tighten both nuts againist the inside of the dropouts. Gradually with 2 wrenches tighten the nut against the dropouts, thus pushing the dropouts apart(wider), do this till you got the desire opening plus a little more as the frame will spring back a bit when the tension is released.

That's what i use basically for dropout spacing ^



For stay clearance it depends on how much and how much stay material i have to work with. On some of the beefier steel one's i just used a pneumatic reciprocating saw and carved out the inside of the stay (just larger than the interference area) and inverted that piece (flipped it over to be concave rather than convex) and welded and smoothed into place. Same method as I use on Harley dished tanks

not my welding ^


cut it out, and either flip over or transfer to the opposite side if not concentric