Three things:
One: particularly in Intermediate, it's OK if your hourglass looks like crap. It's a hard maneuver, and at that level judges expect that it'll look bad. Instead of trying to aim for an hourglass that pulls out at 5 feet, aim for one that pulls out at 10 or 15. That's the wrong spot to be, but a crappy hourglass followed by an overhead eight, a cloverleaf, and a landing will get you somewhere in excess of 100 additional points over a Really Good try at an hourglass that pancakes, and it has the added bonus that you get to fly again that day.
Two: In a contest, an hourglass with four turns, no matter how big, vague, badly placed, etc., will almost certainly get you over ten points, and will get you your pattern points. An hourglass that's an obvious bail-out may not even get you your 10 for an attempt, and may not get you your pattern points.
Three: I'm not sure how this'll work for you, but a local flyer who's climbing fast (and doing better than me) in Expert told me that you should visualize a plane (that's a geometric plane, not an airplane!) that cuts through your feet and the top of your head. That plane defines where the plane should be flying in a wingover, where it should make the transitions in the overhead eights, where it should kiss in the vertical eight, and the line it should be flying for the top part of the hourglass.
Furthermore, if you mess up on the top part of the hourglass, it should be behind your head, not in front of it. Putting it a bit behind your head gives you more room, it's harder for the judges to see the error, and anyway, you usually think you're flying a lot farther back than you really are.
In my opinion it's a lot better to intentionally allow some screwups if it means not crashing -- just know that you're doing them, and fix them as you can. The very best piece of advice I ever got in my Beginner year (thank you Mark Scarborough) was to purposely fly with my bottom line at 10 or 12 feet, until I was consistently hitting that line. Once I was consistent enough, then I could bring the line down without fear of crashing.
This has worked so well for me than now I'm getting snarky comments from judges about putting my bottoms and level flight too low, and when I mess up and come down to two feet off the deck in a maneuver I just laugh hysterically and keep going, instead of freaking out and suddenly getting ground shy.