Kinda falls back to bird and doug's comments--depends on how good the body man is. You can make flawless repairs with hand fabricted patches. One of my quarters is made from a chunk hacked out of a rwd Fleetwood hood. And it's flawless. Then again, it was a good body man--not me--who "installed" the quarter.

Mony not being a factor is nice, but sometimes it is what is more practial than and a better repair than what costs the most money.

You mention buying skins and cutting them down. If you have to cut a skin down, that means that the repair could be done without a full quarter. (The quarter made out of a Cadillac hood? Yep! It could use a full quarter because the quarter was damaged beyond repair, the reason that it wears a hand fabricated quarter. Actually, I could get away with a skin or an 80% part.)

Based on the patch I bought for the 9 lower fender--that I sent back and fabricated my own fender patches--pictures that I have seen of the extremly poor fit of repro fenders, and the comments I have read on the fit of skins and full quarters, all of them are peices o/s. That means installation of these parts are hammer to fit. So if you have to hammer to fit, you might as well section the metal.