No interior grinding is necessary (:jawsdown:), the strut is beded and through bolted and then faired over on the outside.
Replace the strut, at the point your at it's not a hard to do job and there's just fairing compound covering it up.
Thanks for all of the replies. just missed the one in Fairbanks, AML wanted only $85 to ship it down and it's already crated up ready to go.
I've been a customer of Moyer since I bought the boat and have been watching craigslist from Portland to Vancouver all the time looking for an engine to...
As hard as it is, please remember that only you will be agonizing over the dust particles(plus the fact that there's different lighting "outside" versus a garage).
Once the mast is upright again, no one will "see" the imperfections, they'll see the boat with it's new shiny mast!