Follow-up - Raymarine ST4000 autopilot clutch disengaging itself

[jwilson]

Official Raymarine service agent says "take off boat and send in for repair - 1-2 weeks and we can't quote till we've examined it."

Local non-Raymarine marine electronics man says "usually you need to change the belt - they actually seem to shrink rather than stretch. We keep them in stock and you can do it yourself"

I took drive unit apart yesterday, it was very clean inside, and I could see nothing wrong. After reassembling and setting the tension adjustment as low as it would go it works better, though rather more noisily - the lever sort of tries to flip itself down now but doesn't go far enough to disengage (as it used to every few seconds)

I will order a new belt from local man. Having now seen inside it's really a pretty primitive piece of kit for the £350+ cost of the drive unit.

 

[gerryl]

John,

I had The same problem and found that one of the tension wheels was actually stuck solid which was making the other one flip out the lever. Fixed in seconds with wd40 and has been fine for the last two years.

 

[ChrisE]

I probably shouldn't say this but we transatted with a ST4000 with the lever tied down because it kept disengaging.

Still here to tell the tale......

 

[temptress]

[ QUOTE ]
.... with the lever tied down because it kept disengaging......

[/ QUOTE ]

On my last boat I did the same thing. The lever started to disengage as we sailed to the Canaries. I used a small bungee to tie it down and never got around to 'fixing' the lever. I did replace the bungee several times and has to cut it off once as it froze in place in Norway one summer!. When I sold the boat the latest bungee was still providing good service.................
/forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

 

[LadyInBed]

Isn't this a well known problem with these?