Well today, they worked! I spent 6 hours one day working on them until the battery got down to 4.6 volts. I had removed the factory installed wells and did find binding, as you described, when the wire made and arc and hit the wood on the inner most rib, not accesable from the servo opening. In the factory installed set up, there is no clevis,the push rod connects straight in with a safety keeper. I will look into some grease on the shaft. Will also take another look at the bends to the connectors. Had a mechanical engineer RC bud look at the set up and he said that mechanically one should make the bends as close to the servo arm connector as possible. Just enought to clear the connectors when the arm rotates.
Wish there was a text someplace on these things. i have been in RC since 1968 and have stayed away from retracts because of all the trouble I witnessed. This time I needed a war bird for our fly in and had to have them. May be my last retracts! BTW this Hanger 9 P51 with an OS .91 Surpass II is a beautiful flying machine.
Thanks very much for the advice.