Chris, Since I "glassed" over the ends of my pin, I'll give you my take on it. First, the last pin was in there for 25 years....I don't expect to need to take the new one out for a very long time. If I do end up needing to ,though, it takes literally about 30 seconds/side to take a small grinder to that glass patch and remove it, then you are right back where you started. Convenient? No...but a walking pin is not a comfy feeling when you start doing anything more than daysailing (not event then, really) The bolt/washer/locknut is certainly fine, although there are a couple of small disadvantages. One is obviously for the performance oriented person. The keel is acting as a foil when sailing upwind by the mere fact of the angle of attach that it is presented to the flow of water when pointing. I cannot believe that there is not some loss of performance by having an unfair object sticking up into the flow across the surface. Anything like that causes turbulence and turbulence causes separation of the flow from the "foil". That being said, Larry Yake and his Corndog are one of the fast M17's I have seen out there. He posted on here that he uses that set-up and believe me he's still fast...so are we splitting hairs here? Probably. One other consideration might be that if you sail a area prone to kelp, you want there to be as little as possible for that stuff to snag onto should you accidentally run over some. Again, probably not a HUGE concern, but something to think about. I have had some kelp snags and they are not fun...Most of the time they only snag the rudder and just flow off the keel. Getting them off the rudder is not too bad. If they find a way to snag the keel....not fun. Less things sticking out = less things to get snagged on. For me...and this is just my thought process that works for what I do...after trailering the boat and finding the pin 2 inches out to one side after just and hour before being 10 miles offshore in some conditions where I was really depending on the boat to do what she needs to do to keep me and my gal (and yes,,,Bosun! hahaha) safe, I cannot see a reason to not just tack a small glass patch over both sides and be done with it. Whichever way you go, bolt that is 100% without a doubt secured, or a glassed in pin, it's gonna work. Guess it's just preference. I don't think you are missing anything at all :-) Sean M23 "Dauntless"