Uwe,
Thank you very much for your input but I still seem to be missing something. My original problem was I was not setting the alignment when I called addWidget so the layout was stretching my data and not paying attention to the geometry I was trying to set.

Now I'm setting the geometry and minimum width for the widget and adding the widget with an alignment so that it doesn't stretch to take up the entire space. This widget then gets added to a grid layout. All of this is fine and good. My problem is that this is setting the entire widgets width including the rasterview's labels and color map area.

So I haven't found a way to calculate how much space is needed so my column of data is a set size. For example, both the following images have the same geometry and min width in the same grid layout.
This one is the way I want it
notOverWritten.jpg

This one needs more space to show what I want. Notice that the labels and the color bar overlap each other and there is no room for the column of data. How do I set the plot width without the labels and color map bar or how do I work the numbers backwards to determine the space required?
overwritting.jpg

Thanks in advance for any help,
Buffy