Well guys, it's official. My mast broke in half today. My wife and I attempted to lower it ourselves, we took off the front cable only and I got up on the tramp and tried to walk it down myself, while my wife waited for it to get low enough so we could put a screw driver through the hole down at the base. Well as it got lower guess what, I'm sure you already know. The whole mast popped out of the base and the whole thing came crashing down. Were lucky we didn't get killed. Anyway it's broken and I called a local shop who told me its a 1500 dollar investment to replace the mast. There's no way were putting a 1500 dollar mast on a 300 dollar boat. So tomorrow, I'm donating it to a local sailing club.

I think my wife and I are going to save up for a new boat, but in the mean time we'll learn more about how all this is done.