With annual cleaning and maintenance, Barient winches have stood the test of time. There's not much to go wrong even after 35 years, and Barient parts are still available from an Australian after-market supplier--which ought to keep them cranking for years to come.
But maintenance is required--and lack of it is why I had to replace a venerable Barient 19ST mainsheet winch. Grease on the race bearings collects dirt, grit and salt, which is why we clean and oil them periodically. Most of the components are robust and can shrug off neglect, and in fact the most common issue with old winches is compacted, solidified grease on the pawls, which makes them sluggish and can cause the winch to lose grip under load. Which always comes as an, er, surprise.
The exception to the tolerance of inattention is the aluminum drum.
In my case, years of grit in the steel races of the armature wore away the mating surface of the machined aluminum. When that happens, the drum wobbles. Once drum wobble develops, cranking under load makes the damage worse. Unfortunately, replacement drums for Barients are not available.
I considered having a machinist sleeve the mating surface, which sounds plausible, but in the end decided on a new equivalent--the Lewmar 30ST. Defender Industries, the online chandlery, charged about $700, and threw in a $120 10-inch "Powergrip" winch handle, of which more later.
Installation was easy, given the headliner zippers on my Ericson model. After removing the old Barient from the cabin house I smiled to find it had left behind a revolting deposit of ancient grease. But the factory had anticipated just such an occurrence: A neat bead of caulk encircled the pile, put there to prevent it from oozing out. Now there's a shop foreman with foresight. I considered imitating him with a new preventive bead, but the Lewmar, unlike the Barient, can be disassembled sufficient to clean that area if the time ever comes.
...
Naturally, new mounting holes were required, in the same quarter-inch diameter as the old. Ericson drilled a few extras--oops--and then just filled them with caulk, which had expanded out to form little whack-a-moles waiting for a game. I didn't feel like playing so I cut their heads off with a razor blade. Game over.
Did I overdrill the new holes so as to protect the plywood core which Ericson used under gear-mount locations? The wood that came out during drilling was dry, so--nah. They'll seal fine and the old holes are now filled with epoxy/colloidal silica. This is a good application for butyl tape, applied to both sides of the machine screw as it passes though the winch body.
[This winch is incorrectly oriented, as Loren points out in the Comments below. I subsequently rotated the body so the drive gear was under the point of contact of the arriving mainsheet. For more on identification and placement of the drive ("output") gear, see this thread.]
The Lewmar 30ST is about the same size as the Barient 19ST, and in gray aluminum, exactly the same color, so the look of the cabin house is unchanged.
The Lewmar is somewhat easier to disassemble, since the self-tailer is held on only by a hand-tight disk. It's plastic material, like the encircling self-tailer jaws that grasp the line so we don't have to. Barient made all that out of metal, and held the stuff together with either a circlip or a hidden nut. We'll see how the non-metal does in 35 more years.
One unexpected benefit of this winch replacement is the new Lewmar winch handle. It's a tad longer than my three others--two straight Lewmars and a Barient. The best improvement is the insert-extract mechanism, which is controlled from anywhere on the handle, and which works in a most satisfying manner. And I had not anticipated how much difference a "two handed" lever makes (the large grip allows both hands to be used effectively).
Takeaway: keep the Barient races clean. Worn drums can't be replaced.
Full service of larger Barients here.
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But maintenance is required--and lack of it is why I had to replace a venerable Barient 19ST mainsheet winch. Grease on the race bearings collects dirt, grit and salt, which is why we clean and oil them periodically. Most of the components are robust and can shrug off neglect, and in fact the most common issue with old winches is compacted, solidified grease on the pawls, which makes them sluggish and can cause the winch to lose grip under load. Which always comes as an, er, surprise.
The exception to the tolerance of inattention is the aluminum drum.
In my case, years of grit in the steel races of the armature wore away the mating surface of the machined aluminum. When that happens, the drum wobbles. Once drum wobble develops, cranking under load makes the damage worse. Unfortunately, replacement drums for Barients are not available.
I considered having a machinist sleeve the mating surface, which sounds plausible, but in the end decided on a new equivalent--the Lewmar 30ST. Defender Industries, the online chandlery, charged about $700, and threw in a $120 10-inch "Powergrip" winch handle, of which more later.
Installation was easy, given the headliner zippers on my Ericson model. After removing the old Barient from the cabin house I smiled to find it had left behind a revolting deposit of ancient grease. But the factory had anticipated just such an occurrence: A neat bead of caulk encircled the pile, put there to prevent it from oozing out. Now there's a shop foreman with foresight. I considered imitating him with a new preventive bead, but the Lewmar, unlike the Barient, can be disassembled sufficient to clean that area if the time ever comes.
Naturally, new mounting holes were required, in the same quarter-inch diameter as the old. Ericson drilled a few extras--oops--and then just filled them with caulk, which had expanded out to form little whack-a-moles waiting for a game. I didn't feel like playing so I cut their heads off with a razor blade. Game over.
Did I overdrill the new holes so as to protect the plywood core which Ericson used under gear-mount locations? The wood that came out during drilling was dry, so--nah. They'll seal fine and the old holes are now filled with epoxy/colloidal silica. This is a good application for butyl tape, applied to both sides of the machine screw as it passes though the winch body.
[This winch is incorrectly oriented, as Loren points out in the Comments below. I subsequently rotated the body so the drive gear was under the point of contact of the arriving mainsheet. For more on identification and placement of the drive ("output") gear, see this thread.]
The Lewmar 30ST is about the same size as the Barient 19ST, and in gray aluminum, exactly the same color, so the look of the cabin house is unchanged.
The Lewmar is somewhat easier to disassemble, since the self-tailer is held on only by a hand-tight disk. It's plastic material, like the encircling self-tailer jaws that grasp the line so we don't have to. Barient made all that out of metal, and held the stuff together with either a circlip or a hidden nut. We'll see how the non-metal does in 35 more years.
One unexpected benefit of this winch replacement is the new Lewmar winch handle. It's a tad longer than my three others--two straight Lewmars and a Barient. The best improvement is the insert-extract mechanism, which is controlled from anywhere on the handle, and which works in a most satisfying manner. And I had not anticipated how much difference a "two handed" lever makes (the large grip allows both hands to be used effectively).
Takeaway: keep the Barient races clean. Worn drums can't be replaced.
Full service of larger Barients here.
Report Edit Delete IP
