Had a conference this morning following up on your suggestions as well as some others and I am now thinking (of the opinion) that we need to REALLY pack the daylights out of the seal on installation such that we drive as much pressure as can be brought to bear into the ends of the rope seal to make the rope bulge and fatten up such that it will be very tight. I am now coming around to suspect that with each seal, we simply repeated our errors of not packing the ends down hard enough prior to install.
We will use a GM seal installation tool and a small dowel to push that seal into the pocket very aggressively on the next attempt.
Your comments are great and VERY helpful. Now take away all the sharp objects in my home and give a few days to drink my frustration under the table and I'll be fine!
