Cheap Chinese-made chain saw

[gmerkt]

I have a Stihl MS 290 which has a 20 inch bar / chain. It's the one I use for "bigger" work. Any bigger than that I hire it done. But I've had this machine for 20 years, at least. It's been a pretty good saw. A few years ago, it wouldn't fire, so I sent away for a coil kit. Which I changed and it fired right up. I may have replaced the carb. somewhere along the line, too. But lately it's been sitting for at least a year. About a week ago, we had a blow that toppled a big upper branch off of an old maple tree. I have a Stihl chain saw with a 16 inch bar / chain, and I use that to clean off all the little stuff before I get to the major branches. For those I change over to the 20 inch saw. When I did that last week, I couldn't get the 20 inch to fire. I tried all the little tricks to nurse it back, nothing doing.

Mind you, I try to use non-ethanol gasoline for my small engine equipment. Been doing it for years. But a few years ago, the place I used to buy it changed ownership and no longer sells it. So sometime since then, I ran out, got lazy, and started using gas station fuel mixed with oil. And this may be part of the problem. Friday, I got two gallons of non-ethanol gasoline at a special place. 92 octane, $6 a gallon, they sell it to people with older performance cars too. I think in some places, it's sold as Rec-90 fuel. You can get it at some boat docks too.

First idea, to look into getting a brand new Stihl 290 replacement. After all, my present one is at least 20 years old. And, one thing I will never do is buy a used chain saw. Enough said about that. Thinking new is because I know how much the boys at the Stihl store charge and my 290 needs a bit of work. And, I need it right now. Knowing that replacing the MS 290 would be an approximately $500 to $600 proposition at the Stihl store, I decided to look online to see if Amazon sells the Stihl brand. If they sell something branded Stihl that is comparable to my MS 290, I didn't see it. What caught my attention was the cheap Chinese-made 20 inch chain saw for $113. I'm thinking, "How bad can it be?" I decided to gamble that amount and find out. At the same time, I also ordered a rebuild kit for my MS 290, which includes a new coil, new carb, air filter, blah blah blah, probably also made in China.

The Amazon seller of these saws sells them under the Pinc and Wemars brands. They seem interchangeable in order fulfilment. What I got was a Wemars. Petrol chain saw. The instructions, allegedly in English, are typical of those furnished with lots of Chinese stuff with more that two moving parts. In other words, almost unintelligible. I don't get it. The Chinese have been selling junk to Americans for a few decades, haven't they found someone yet who translates English so we can understand it?? If they can't find such a person in China, would it cost all that much to have an American do the translation here, then send it back to them for printing???

Anyway, the new Wemars instructions do not match the machine I got. The controls are a bit different. There is a supplementary sheet that shows a different design saw with different controls, and this one doesn't match the machine I got either. I'm used to the Stihl throttle lockout lever on top of the handle. So you can set the throttle at about half for start-up. Which is tied in with the choke. The Wemars has this lockout lever, but it doesn't do anything. There is no provision to fix the lockout lever in position to hold the throttle partially open. The instructions (that don't match my saw) show a button to set the lever, but it's not present on my machine. What my Wemars has is a manual choke. Maybe it doesn't need the throttle locked half in to start. Because it seems to start fine leaving the throttle closed and using the choke. Maybe the lockout lever is just there, doing nothing, because they had X number of such handles left over when they changed design. Waste not, want not. But please give me something in the instructions about my specific saw.

The saw ran like a scalded dog yesterday and today. It started cold and hot flawlessly on both days. So I have no complaints about my $113 saw. Which it occurred to me that I'd better buy before the Chinese ships quit coming to our shores.

Now that I've got the repair kit for the MS 290, I'll work on that in my spare time.

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[Tlock]

Been running a big Chinese saw "the blue thunder" for 5 years now. Pushing a 32 inch barrel the big saw does well! I only went this route because my husky 385xp was stolen

 

[gmerkt]

My success with the Chinese Wemars makes me want to buy a pole chain saw made in China. I think they have 16 foot reach. I can't remember the cost, maybe $150? But I've been thinking about one of those. For limbing the lower hanging, dead underwood on fir trees. Especially since I've been thinking a lot about what it would be like if a forest fire erupted nearby. Like Paradise, Calif. a few years ago.

 

[Stomper]

I have a Stihl MS 290 which has a 20 inch bar / chain. It's the one I use for "bigger" work. Any bigger than that I hire it done. But I've had this machine for 20 years, at least. It's been a pretty good saw. A few years ago, it wouldn't fire, so I sent away for a coil kit. Which I changed and it fired right up. I may have replaced the carb. somewhere along the line, too. But lately it's been sitting for at least a year. About a week ago, we had a blow that toppled a big upper branch off of an old maple tree. I have a Stihl chain saw with a 16 inch bar / chain, and I use that to clean off all the little stuff before I get to the major branches. For those I change over to the 20 inch saw. When I did that last week, I couldn't get the 20 inch to fire. I tried all the little tricks to nurse it back, nothing doing.

Mind you, I try to use non-ethanol gasoline for my small engine equipment. Been doing it for years. But a few years ago, the place I used to buy it changed ownership and no longer sells it. So sometime since then, I ran out, got lazy, and started using gas station fuel mixed with oil. And this may be part of the problem. Friday, I got two gallons of non-ethanol gasoline at a special place. 92 octane, $6 a gallon, they sell it to people with older performance cars too. I think in some places, it's sold as Rec-90 fuel. You can get it at some boat docks too.

First idea, to look into getting a brand new Stihl 290 replacement. After all, my present one is at least 20 years old. And, one thing I will never do is buy a used chain saw. Enough said about that. Thinking new is because I know how much the boys at the Stihl store charge and my 290 needs a bit of work. And, I need it right now. Knowing that replacing the MS 290 would be an approximately $500 to $600 proposition at the Stihl store, I decided to look online to see if Amazon sells the Stihl brand. If they sell something branded Stihl that is comparable to my MS 290, I didn't see it. What caught my attention was the cheap Chinese-made 20 inch chain saw for $113. I'm thinking, "How bad can it be?" I decided to gamble that amount and find out. At the same time, I also ordered a rebuild kit for my MS 290, which includes a new coil, new carb, air filter, blah blah blah, probably also made in China.

The Amazon seller of these saws sells them under the Pinc and Wemars brands. They seem interchangeable in order fulfilment. What I got was a Wemars. Petrol chain saw. The instructions, allegedly in English, are typical of those furnished with lots of Chinese stuff with more that two moving parts. In other words, almost unintelligible. I don't get it. The Chinese have been selling junk to Americans for a few decades, haven't they found someone yet who translates English so we can understand it?? If they can't find such a person in China, would it cost all that much to have an American do the translation here, then send it back to them for printing???

Anyway, the new Wemars instructions do not match the machine I got. The controls are a bit different. There is a supplementary sheet that shows a different design saw with different controls, and this one doesn't match the machine I got either. I'm used to the Stihl throttle lockout lever on top of the handle. So you can set the throttle at about half for start-up. Which is tied in with the choke. The Wemars has this lockout lever, but it doesn't do anything. There is no provision to fix the lockout lever in position to hold the throttle partially open. The instructions (that don't match my saw) show a button to set the lever, but it's not present on my machine. What my Wemars has is a manual choke. Maybe it doesn't need the throttle locked half in to start. Because it seems to start fine leaving the throttle closed and using the choke. Maybe the lockout lever is just there, doing nothing, because they had X number of such handles left over when they changed design. Waste not, want not. But please give me something in the instructions about my specific saw.

The saw ran like a scalded dog yesterday and today. It started cold and hot flawlessly on both days. So I have no complaints about my $113 saw. Which it occurred to me that I'd better buy before the Chinese ships quit coming to our shores.

Now that I've got the repair kit for the MS 290, I'll work on that in my spare time.

Welcome to the wonderful hybrid language of, "chinglish"!

 

[JuglansRegia]

Yes, chinglish instructions for stuff made out of chineasium with no replacement parts stream, but it's cheap.

 

[Tlock]

Yes, chinglish instructions for stuff made out of chineasium with no replacement parts stream, but it's cheap.

The particular saw i have is all stihl compatible

 

[Bobbygun]

$113? Man, that is cheap. And that's coming from a guy who buys Poulans at Bi-Mart like they are disposable. I've been running the same 20" Poulan for the last seven years or so. I only cut about four cords of firewood per year and also use it to remove storm damage on my property (about 3 acres), so I usually get quite a few years out of a saw. I think I paid around $150 for my current saw. Couldn't get it started last week, so I was looking at the current offering from Bi-Mart. They wanted $259.99. Fortunately, it turned out I just needed a new spark plug and now I'm back in business. My last Poulan was a 16" model that ran for over ten years but the chain oiler stopped working. I thought about trying to repair it, but decided I wanted a bigger saw anyway. It would probably still run, but I haven't tried to start it in a couple of years.

 

[red442joe]

Welcome to the wonderful hybrid language of, "chinglish"!

Well there's y'all's problem!
It's printed in "Engrish".
Carry on...

Joe

 

[P7M13]

@gmerkt, on your MS290, check the in-tamk fuel filter (presuming it has one).
I have an old Homelite XL 30" that ethanol ate the fuel feed lines. Once I replaced those, she's run like a hungry beast ever since.

 

[gmerkt]

@gmerkt, on your MS290, check the in-tamk fuel filter (presuming it has one).
I have an old Homelite XL 30" that ethanol ate the fuel feed lines. Once I replaced those, she's run like a hungry beast ever since.

I've replaced that when I replaced the coil a few years ago. I'll go over all that stuff again with the kit I got lately. The pressure is off now. The Wemars got me through the storm blow-down, plus about half a cord of red alder that the county left along the side of the road. I'm 74 years old, can still carry, cut, split and stack wood. It's now a case of which will last longer, my saws or my body.

 

[MikeInOr]

During my last tree fall cleanup I finally bought a Dewalt Flexvolt 60v chainsaw. I will never go back to a gasser! I cleaned the carb on my Husqvarna gasser and got it running after I got the fallen tree cleared but the Dewalt is now my go to saw.

I also have the 20v Dewalt pole saw which is also a great saw.

 

[Tlock]

During my last tree fall cleanup I finally bought a Dewalt Flexvolt 60v chainsaw. I will never go back to a gasser! I cleaned the carb on my Husqvarna gasser and got it running after I got the fallen tree cleared but the Dewalt is now my go to saw.

I also have the 20v Dewalt pole saw which is also a great saw.

I'm sure for little jobs and cleanup electric would be fine. It definitely wouldn't work for me, I put up 10 plus cords a year as it's our only heat source

 

[MikeInOr]

I'm sure for little jobs and cleanup electric would be fine. It definitely wouldn't work for me, I put up 10 plus cords a year as it's our only heat source

I don't see the loggers carrying around battery powered chainsaws yet so you are probably right. But my 20" Dewalt with the 60v, 15ah battery runs longer than I do so that is really all that matters to me! Given the silence, better torque over my Husqvarna 353, no pull starting and no smokey oily air I am sold on my battery powered chainsaw.

If I were running to the woods for firewood I would definitely be bringing my Husqvarna chainsaw along. But I would be bringing my Dewalt along too.

 

[BoringCruffler]

For many years I had a Craftsman (made by King-Seeley in Ypsilante, MI) saw that came out of the factory with a 16" bar, but had plenty of power to run a 20". When I wore that out, I went down to the old Oregon factory in Milwaukie, and they took my saw into the back and about a half hour later came back with a new bar and a couple of chains. They had custom drilled the bar to fit the Craftsman. They didn't charge me for the 'custom' bar, and gave me 'employee pricing' on the chains. Back when there was service.

I ran that silly saw for nearly thirty years (had bought it second hand). The only other thing I really ever did to it was to replace the points with a solid state ignitor. But, I noticed that it kept getting louder and louder. The bloody muffler was literally disintegrating from the inside out. I took it several places and just couldn't find a muffler for it. I eventually redrilled and mounted a lawn mower muffler on it, but it was still too loud, even with earplugs.

So I retired it and bought one of the rather inexpensive Ryobi 20" gas saws, not really expecting much, but you know... I've had that thing for ten years now, and it really works well. I'm quite surprised both at the power (not as much as the Craftsman, but sufficient) and how well it has held up.

For bigger jobs, I still switch over to the Big Stihl. My old brain is forgetting the model, but I run it with a wide-pitch 26" bar, and haven't yet found anything it wont cut.

Last spring, my son and i went fishing down around Mt. Bachelor. The main road was still gated, though there wasn't much snow to be seen. When the gates are up, we take Siah Butte Rd. around 'em, and there are often trees that have come down over winter, so I usually bring the Ryobi along. It was just as a last minute thing that I through the Stihl in the back of the truck too.

The first two trees were about eight inches across, and the Ryobi made very short work of them, but about fifteen miles in, there was a fir that had pulled the whole root-ball out of the ground, and the part across the road had to be four feet in diameter. I had my son start delimbing it with the Ryobi, and got out what I call 'The Big Saw' (yes, many people have bigger saws than me... bigger other things too, I'm sure, but I'm not a professional in either area, I just like things that work and last).

It took less than an hour to cut four sections out of that tree (the biggest that we could roll off the road).

The moral of the story is that if you get a decent one, there isn't anything wrong with a Chinese chainsaw, but I ain't giving up my American made Bruiser even if it doesn't get as many hours of use in a year as the import.

 

[The Heretic]

When I moved rural 13 years ago, I picked up a Stihl MS461. Way too big & heavy for what I do, but my thinking was better to have too big than not big enough. Wrong - at least for me. I should have got a 260.

A few years ago I picked up a much smaller/lighter Echo as part of a trade. Not near the quality of a Stihl, but I use it more because it is much lighter and handier.

I think what I want in the future is a battery operated Stihl. I am trying to build my pickup & truck into "overlanding" rigs, and I will want a chainsaw to deal with trees that fall across roads/trails. Both rigs are diesel powered, I don't want to deal gasoline just for a chainsaw, so I am thinking battery power.

 

[foxmeadow]

I bought an EGO 16" saw to keep behind the seat of my truck. It has more power than I expected, but it drools bar oil like my Husqvarna and Stihl saws, so it only goes in the truck when it is out of oil.
In 1997 I bought a Husqvarna 266XP on the advice of a neighbor who ran a thinning crew. Great saw, 28" bar and ran strongly until 4 years ago, when the compression got to be to much for my arthritic hands. It went to Mr. Chainsaw in Eugene to have the cylinder and piston from a 272XP installed, which has a compression release in it. I'm still running it, with more power than it had before. Parts are getting harder to get, not that it needs any..

 

[OrPackrat]

I bought a cheap China saw years ago, didn't like the feel of it, felt decent, but ended up giving it to a tow truck operator who had his truck saw stolen...

After the canyon fires, I bought 2 saws,

MS171 16"
MS391 28"

Only issue I ever had over the years, the little saw I use the most, it ended with a clogged exhaust and had a basic service done...

Ethanol free premium fuel only as that's the only Ethanol free fuel around me...

Have had plenty of cheap China versions of things, they tend to work alright, but with such things, I tend to keep a quality backup for when they end up failing...

 

[foxmeadow]

A local chainsaw shop that has,sadly, gone out of business had a sign over the counter recommending premium gas with ethanol and adding a ethanol eliminator/stabilizer like StarTron enzyme fuel treatment. The reasoning is that Clear Gas sits in tanks too long while people only buy 5 gallons or so, for their various internal small engines. My neighbor bought a 55 gallon barrel of clear gas and over the next year he noticed a slight decrease in power., motors harder to start, etc.

 

[fstdraw]

Buy the best and cry only once, you cheap asses!

 

[gmerkt]

During my last tree fall cleanup I finally bought a Dewalt Flexvolt 60v chainsaw. I will never go back to a gasser! I cleaned the carb on my Husqvarna gasser and got it running after I got the fallen tree cleared but the Dewalt is now my go to saw.

I've got a Craftsman corded electric, I forget if it's 14 in. or 16 in., I had one of each bought cheaply at Goodwill and I gave one away so I don't remember which one I kept. I haven't used it for years now. In the past, I used it for limbing smaller stuff but no longer. That's what I use my Stihl 16 inch for. I will save stuff down to about 1-1/2. Used to be if I had a big pile of these to cut, I'd lean a wood shipping pallet up against a tree, then place end of a smaller piece into a slat in the pallet. As a holding fixture. Then I'd cut the length into shorter sticks for the wood stove. Even with slow rotation, the work would go rather quickly that way and kept chains out of the dirt.

I'm sure for little jobs and cleanup electric would be fine.

Yes, this. And on corded iterations the chain rotation is much slower than gas powered saws so injuries to Nimrod Homeowner are less apt to be severe. Still quite possible to severe an artery with slow rotation. That's why some people carry a GI shoe lace around for a tourniquet.

(the biggest that we could roll off the road).

Yes, I have to limit sizes to what I can lift or roll. And once I roll it, I usually have to be able to lift it. That's why the maul and wedges are always carried along with.

Some of what I drag home comes courtesy of county or PUD crews. Who aren't always considerate about lengths of rounds. Or straightness of cuts. I always wind up with a pile of trimmings. But those are made of wood too. I've discovered that fire doesn't care much about shapes, but pieces do have to be able to fit inside the wood stove.