Re: OT: best chain saw to buy

Posted by jdemaris on April 09, 2005 at 20:16:39 from (209.23.28.22):

In Reply to: OT: best chain saw to buy posted by another hoosier on April 09, 2005 at 14:27:10:

The old Remmington Mall saws were well built, rugged, and very crude by today's standards. They were in the same class as the old gear reduction drive Homelites like the Buz, or Super Wiz. The later Remmingtons, ca. 1970s-80s like what John Deere used to sell painted green, were absolute crap.
When I worked for Asplundh in the late 1960s and early 70s, all we used was Mculloch and Homelite. Good rugged saws as far as taking crashes when you dropped them out of trees. But, they were often stalling, didn't want to start when hot, etc. etc. We thought they were good saws until we started using Stihls in the early 70s. At first I was skeptical - especially with new devices like "automatic oilers." But, what a difference. They always started, they'd idle between cuts without stalling, they outlast the Homelite XL12s four-to-one. So, there was no going back. I still have all my older Stihls, never ruined one yet. I've got an S10, O40, O41, 041 Super, O30, O8S, and an 045 Super. Sometime around the late 80s, Stihl stopped using magnesium parts and changed over to plastic - I guess to lighten the saws. Personally, I'd rather have the extra weight with the metal.
Today, from what I've see with logger friends and their saws, at least with the professional model saws, the Huskys and Echos seem to perform and hold up just as well as the Stihls. At a home-owner level of saw, I don't know. I was a Stihl mechanic at a Deere dealership, and when Stihl started making a cheap line of saws, some of them were crap - especially the 011 and 015. I've heard their newer line of consumer level saws is pretty good. I bought a couple of Poulans at at gargage sale a few years ago, assuming them to be junk as most Poulans used to be. But, these had the Sears Craftman Professional label on them, and it seems they are a little better quality than Poulan's low-level models. I've been quite impressed with them.
No matter what saw you buy, try to find one that has ball bearings on both sides of the crankshaft, and a chromium impregnated cylinder wall or made with the Mahle process. The cheap saws use needle bearings that ride directly on the crankshaft (and the cranks wear out), and cylinder walls with a cheap plating that peels off the first time it gets overheated. Saws built like that are, more-or-less "throw-away saws."

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