The forearm spacer would absolutely make sense. We never thought of it. Reading through about 40 pages of threads on this board has convinced me that almost no matter what goes wrong with a handi you guys have see it, can explain it, and know how to fix it. Probably at home, in 10 minutes with simple tools. With customer support like you have here it's easy to feel confident in a product.
Here's what I think I'm going to do. Either this afternoon or early next week I'm going to wander down to wally world and order a youth 22lr. This will get me a nice light hopefully good shooting 22 that I can use now and my kids can use in the futre. $108 plus tax spent according to wally's web site. Then in the fall I'll get a stainless in 30-06 ($250) and immediately send it off to HR for some wood, a vented 12 ga barrel and a .410 barrel. With the Vented barrel, the stainless reciever and some wood I'll have recreated the look of the Topper which is the most attractive of the guns by far. Between the 22, the .410, the 12ga and the 06 I'll have everythin that I could possibly shoot covered and I'll still be in the general cost of replacing the BPS.
The best part about this is that ever gun will fee and operate the same and I can present this as a logical business case to my wife. Can't argue agianst logic now can you. Excited to get shooting agian.