Barber hauler.

Barber haulers can vary a bit according to the application.

Usually it's a block pulling sideways on the headsail sheet, say halfway along or if anything closer to the clew of the sail.

First one either leads the sheet through the block ( which must have a becket eye ) or ideally snaps on a side opening block.

A line from the eye on the block is led athwartships to a cleat, whether it's through a fairlead first, and what sort of cleat depends on the boat and owner but the line must be easily adjustable, and long enough to pay out slack when off the wind.

The purpose of the Barber hauler is to give a closer sheeting angle to the boat centreline when beating, usually a temporary fix in light winds.

Obviously it takes trial and error, and frequent adjustment when close hauled, to avoid hooking the leach of the headsail and spoiling it's shape.

Well worth playing with if pointing to windward is disappointing.
 
I sometimes make up a temporary one using karabiners... not quite as good as using the proper side opening block, but cheap and easy. You could always invest in the proper setup once you've convinced yourself it's worth it ?

From memory I've only used mine when flying a spinnaker...
 
Or, if you have a boat (like mine) which doesn't have genoa tracks, you use a barbour hauler to bring the clew down when the sheets are eased, to stop the upper section of leach flapping. Works a treat.
 
Barber haulers can pull the sheet towards or away from the middle of the boat, or downwards.
It's a general technique of deflecting the sheet to change the angle.
The key thing is that it takes much less force to deflect the sheet than is in the sheet itself.
Unless you are deflecting it through a very big angle.
Typical uses include deflecting the sheet out when sailing up wind but 'cracked off' of close hauled, e.g. if sailing in a lot of chop. (or even 2 sail reaching).
Or pulling the sheet in to point really high.
Or pulling the sheet down, to get more leech tension and less foot tension, to keep the jib fuller. Often combined with the first case.

Also can be used when the jib tracks/fairleads are simply in the wrong place because you're not using the sails the boat designer first thought of....
It's easier to tweak a barber hauler than to slide the tracks on many boats. And it can be done from a position where you can see the sail shape.
 
Not sure if we are talking barber hauler or twing here.

Depending on who you read, a BH draws the angle down and a twing or inhauler in or out.

BH are certainly an American dinghy invention named for the inventors and are certainly used in more ways these days.

The BH is most often found on a shared spinnaker sheet / guy - mostly when the line is a sheet it flies free, when a guy it is drawn down.

Non overlapping headsails can often benefit from being sheeted inside the stays to improve pointing and change the slot width.

Genoas can often benefit from being sheeted more outboard in particular air conditions.

Both these can be realised with twings, although the control lines can be complicated if you want to vary them and will probably need different attachment points.

These days blocks aren't often used, low friction (aluminium) rings are used in several ways. And they are cheaper. On some high end racing machines the roller arrangement on the car is replaced with a ring which can be controlled in all planes.

On my boat I have carabiners to hold the guys in place, negating the BH and associated weight on the sheets.

I also have twings with aluminium rings associated with the jib, allowing the clew to be brought in towards the mast, controlled from the cockpit .

For light winds the deck fixed carabiner can also be used to hold the (genoa) sheet angle outboard.

If I were designing a new rig I would have one track fore and aft and two tracks at right angles, one just forward of the stays, the other at 110%, and probably spend all day tweaking the sheets instead of sailing.:rolleyes:
 
Last edited:
Kerenza said:
Not sure if we are talking barber hauler or twing here.

....:
Click to expand...

Twing, sounds more like 'twinning line' sometimes known as a 'choke' or 'strangler'.
That's more often associated with the spinnaker around here, more of an on/off control to convert a sheet into a guy, although can be used to pull the sheet down a little too.

One boat I sailed on, the owner used a 'movable sheet' to sheet the jib to the toe rail, it clipped onto the clew not the sheet, so was not IMHO a barber, but, hey, the owner is always right!

Sometimes 'pull the red string' is safer.
 
If you have an aluminium toe rail with holes in it a quick and simple way to try a barber hauler is to use a lightish line. Tie one end to toe rail, pass line over sheet and back through next hole in toe rail and tension to adjust sheet angle. If this looks as if it will work the way you want then rig a better system with blocks.

Incidentally, have read that cruising chutes don't set or are unstable dead down wind. In lightish winds, F2to3 without mainsail, we have used ours on a dead run by using a barber hauler to pull the sheet down and well forward. Perhaps not the best sail shape but it remained stable, even when sailing by the lee, and kept us moving at an acceptable speed.
 
I'd always thought - for no good reason I can think of now except that I grew up using them on British dinghies - that the Barber Hauler was a British invention, does anyone know, was there some eccentric inventor / performance sailor called Barber ?
 
One ring to bind them all....

If the boat owner has more money than sense, these Barton aluminum ( ! ) rings are all very nice, and colorful ( ! )....

rt2.jpg


and

rt3.jpg



Then there's the cheapskate's approach....

ring-1.jpg
 
oldbilbo said:
If the boat owner has more money than sense, these Barton aluminum ( ! ) rings are all very nice, and colorful ( ! )....

The Selden ones are cheaper than snatch blocks, but if you go the stainless ring route I've seen round carabiner (?) ones which give the advantage of being clipped and unclipped without rerouting the sheet.

Diameter is important, :eek:, depending on rope type. Good old dyneema is nice and slippery too!
Click to expand...
 
Lots of good info above.... I too have always referred to a barber hauler for downward pull, not inboard.

One other, ocassionally useful use for a barber hauler, is that if the hauler fitting is quite near the clew of the foresail, then cranking it down really tight with the sheets freed off a bit is a good way of taming the sheets a little to make track adjustments easier if you don't have control lines on the cars.
 
Another side effect of the barber hauler is that when applying inward pressure with the hauler one can ease sheet tension & allow the leach of the jib to twist off a bit which may help sail trim in different strength winds
The squib class uses them to great effect & the tension is regularly altered in association with sheet tension

If one has a self tacking jib a down hauler (rather than an in hauler) attached to the clew allows one to tension the leech in a bit to compensate for the inability to move the jib sheet car forward as the boat come off the wind
 
As for high loads on headsail sheets and inability to move the cars forward on their tracks, I find standing a foot on the sheet then moving the car works well; a bit brutal maybe but effective !

On the Anderson 22 ( same designer as the Squib, Oliver Lee ) with it's wide sheeting base, in light winds I've found it advantageous to lead the sheets inside the guardrails so the boat points higher close-hauled, but as soon as the wind picks up one has to re-lead the sheets outside.
 
Last edited:
Seajet said:
As for high loads on headsail sheets and inability to move the cars forward on their tracks, I find standing a foot on the sheet then moving the car works well; a bit brutal maybe but effective !

On the Anderson 22 with it's wide sheeting base, in light winds I've found it advantageous to lead the sheets inside the guardrails so the boat points higher close-hauled, but as soon as the wind picks up one has to re-lead the sheets outside.
Click to expand...
Might work on a 22'er, but on a 45'er, you'd end up tightrope walking!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top