Barnett Crossbow Parts

Everything in the first group is maintenance you should budget for. Anything in the last row is a reason to stop shooting the bow until someone qualified has looked at it.

The rail is the surface the string travels across on every shot, and a dry rail destroys strings faster than shooting does. Barnett sells a rail and lubrication wax combo kit precisely because these are two different products for two different surfaces: lube for the rail, wax for the string.

What to look for: the string path should carry a thin film, not a thick smear. Too much lube collects grit and turns the rail into an abrasive, which is worse than running it slightly dry. If you can feel a groove worn into the rail or the surface has gone rough, more lube will not fix it - that is a shop assessment, and fitting a new string to a damaged rail just feeds the new string into the same grinder.

The bolt retention spring is the small leaf that holds the bolt down against the rail so it stays seated while you shoulder and aim. It is genuinely small, genuinely easy to lose, and if it is bent the bolt can lift off the rail. Replacements are cheap and worth keeping a spare of.

Barnett fits anti-dry-fire mechanisms to its modern crossbows. Treat that as a safety net, not permission. A dry-fire can still damage limbs, cams and rail, and the common cause is a bolt that was not pushed fully back against the string - or, on a Barnett specifically, the wrong bolt family entirely. Check the nock is seated hard against the string every time you load.

Barnett's long production history works in owners' favour here. String and cable sets are still available for the Jackal, Wildcat C5 and C6, Raptor FX, Recruit, Quad 400, GameCrusher, Ghost 350 CRT, Ghost 360, Ghost 400 CRT, Ghost 410, Predator AVI and CRT, Droptine STR and the XP series. Headhunter bolts have been in production for decades and fit all of them.

What becomes hard to find is structural: limbs, cams, trigger assemblies and stocks. These are model-specific mouldings and castings, nobody makes them aftermarket, and when manufacturer stock is gone it is gone. If a limb has cracked on a twenty-year-old Jackal, replacing the crossbow is usually the realistic answer - which is worth knowing before you spend on a new string for it.

The honest test before spending on a discontinued bow: are the limbs, cams and rail sound? If yes, every wear item is available and the bow has years left. If no, stop.

What is worth having before the season rather than during it:

• More bolts than you expect to need, in the right family, matched to your zero
• Rail lube and string wax
• A spare bolt retention spring
• Spare scope batteries if your reticle is illuminated
• A spare string, if the bow is more than two seasons old and you can get to a shop

None of it is expensive. All of it is the difference between a ten-minute problem and a lost hunt.