# Crack in forward wishbone casting

**URL:** <https://nonsuch.discourse.group/t/crack-in-forward-wishbone-casting/10333>\
**Category:** General\
**Tags:** failure-causes\
**Created:** [April 27, 2026, 8:41pm UTC](https://nonsuch.discourse.group/t/crack-in-forward-wishbone-casting/10333 "2026-04-27T20:41:03Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 2

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**Author:** ![Rob](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex011/user_avatar/nonsuch.discourse.group/rob/32/11_2.png) [@Rob](https://nonsuch.discourse.group/u/Rob)\
**Post date:** [April 27, 2026, 9:42pm UTC](https://nonsuch.discourse.group/t/crack-in-forward-wishbone-casting/10333/2 "2026-04-27T21:42:13Z")

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Hi Bill,  
I feel your pain, last season I went through the same questions about a crack in Soave’s mast collar. [Link to my post](https://nonsuch.discourse.group/t/damaged-mast-collar/1039).

I am not a rigger, engineer, or a metallurgist. My thoughts are based on my experience with Soave and previous boats.

1. Seized stainless screw are common on a Nonsuch. Well maintained boats use an isolation paste to prevent this. After you’ve removed a dozen or so seized bolts or screws you may feel as I do, a tub of TEF45 or equivalent belongs onboard every Nonsuch. Buy some penetrating oil, a batch of left-handed bits and some extractors. I’m not strong enough to break off a phillips head screw, which is good… it’s much easier to drill them out if they aren’t broken. Triple the time you think it will take to remove hardware unless you’ve removed it before and used isolation paste when you reassembled. With practice it gets easier.
2. The stress relief hole might provide some short term benefit, but the cast fitting will continue to age at an accelerated rate. I’m not a metallurgist, but my old mast collar seems different from the new one. Does cast aluminum age over 40 years in a marine environment ?
3. I have talked to Nonsuch owners that have experienced collar failures and mast failures. I have not heard of a wishbone forward casting failure.
4. Additional thoughts ( which weighed heavily in my decision ) in 5 years will it be harder to find a replacement ? My assessment is yes. So I replaced the damaged collar.

Sorry, I doubt anything I’ve said is new or surprising.

It’s a shared experience for Nonsuch owners.

Good luck,  
Rob…

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