New Starter grinding

You have a cheap starter. Get a new one and stop complaining.

Starter on my 81SN is new this past May. This weekend I had a strange thing happen. Went to start after running it all day. Sounded like it was grinding, of course I stopped, tried again, same thing. Told the kids go do some thing for an hour I will be working on the boat for a while. Disconnected the battery, took starter off and pulled it out. I found a 1 inch bushing inside the bell housing. I looked at the starter and the spindle that the gear slides up and down on was tilted. I figured the bushing went in side the end of the starter and the spindle went inside it. Did that, found what I thought was a compression ring and pounded that in the end of the starter. Put the starter back in hooked up the battery and cranked first time, no grinding and worked the rest of the weekend. We were back skiing, wakeboarding and tubing in 45 minutes. I don’t know what I did was right but it worked.

Does anyone know what might have happen to the started and should I see about exchanging it for a new one since its only 5-6 months old?