Originally Posted by ck42

This sounds very similar to what I finally discovered.
At the top where the rod would thread in...I thought...you could sort of pop it out of the tube. This section that contained the threads inside was actually about 1/4 exposed so that I could just push the rod inside it....and then push the whole thing back down until it was clipped back into place.

The most difficult part was figuring exactly how much of the rod needed to go in in order to have the element positioned properly....so that when it was in the unlock position and lock position, that it could go all the way up or all the way down properly.

Thanks everyone for the ideas and help!