Do New Chainsaws Need To Be Gently Broken In?

[7sleeper]

...
Left 87 octane untreated corn crap gas in my genset for 9 mo's and had to boil the bowl gasket for it to shrink enough to go back into the lands - and remove the shellac off everything inside it...

For that I have fuel shut off valves on all such equipment. Very easy then to let them run dry. Just turn of the equipment with the fuel shut off valve off.

7

 

[Jim Timber]

For that I have fuel shut off valves on all such equipment. Very easy then to let them run dry. Just turn of the equipment with the fuel shut off valve.

7

Yeah, that one was my eff up. Never treated the tank and never ran the carb out. We'd been without utility power for 4 days and I got distracted when the lines went hot again and didn't properly stow it after that much use.

 

[teacherman]

If you are concerned about break-in, you can always richen the high screw 1/8-1/4 turn for the first five tanks of fuel.

Saw care is a definite issue for me. I'll admit to getting a bit anal about it, but my saws run pretty well as a rule. I like to let them warm up about a half minute with short throttle revs. I ONLY use Stihl Ultra synthetic oil with ethanol-free premium gas. It keeps well for a long time, but I'll pour it out after a year. Idling a saw dry will let it keep indefinitely, according to Andy (Lakeside) our former AS saw guru. I try to let them idle a minute or so after use; I hear it helps the coils cool off a bit. I have a little saw tach, and I find the manual for the saw, and set it to a few hundred RPMs below the manual's recs at WOT, AFTER break-in.

I have a 20 year old Lawn Boy 2 stroke mower I set the RPMs on, it still works great. FWIW...