Andy: this is great stuff; thanks (and to bradtx as well). I'm suspicious of the 1.5 gap as well which is why I posted this. I've never seen a gap that big. I thought that the dang thing must be cross threaded but the cup turns pretty easily and the threads don't look bad. It is tight in spots, though, which is not a good sign (and very, very tight at the very end just before the cup touches the shell). I thought that when a cup was cross threaded that it would be very difficult to turn but that is not the case here.

I don't have a machinist's square, though. I should be able to use a carpenters square, right? Now I just have to go out and buy one which will make the wife happy as she'll no doubt find a project for me to use it on,

Edit: my camera is only so-so but I'll see if I can post some decent pics of the cup tonight. I tried to thread a different cup and it felt tight and I immediately backed off (no reason to ruin another cup) which suggests that cross threading is the real problem.