[quote=Dogboy]Something in your explanation is mixed up. You are saying you are trying to thread the OUTER bolts into the casting, but that's impossible. The outer connections are thru-bolted with a bolt that drops down through the hole in the casting and a nut which is held inside the stainless channel under the hull flange.
The INBOARD bolts are different. The bolt is inserted into the stainless steel channel under the hull flange and passed up into a threaded casting which is riveted inside the ctossbar.
It sounds like your inboard casting may be stripped. This can happen if you aren't careful when assembling the boat. You need to carefully get all of the inboard bolts (forward and aft crossbars) lined up and started in the castings. Then do the outside bolts and finally tighten everything down. If your inboard casting is stripped, then you are correct that you need to disassemble the dolphin striker and remove the outside casting to gain access inside the crossbar. This can be extremely difficult to do if there is corrosion between the dolphin striker rod and the casting- it will seize.
First thing I would do would be to entirely remove the crossbar from the boat and inspect/clean the threads on both inboard castings and determine if they are in fact stripped. You would need to remove the crossbar from the boat anyway if it turns out that you have to repair the inboard castings.
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