Due to the lack of dealers in our area, we were limited to the choice of saws available. I’m sure there were other good saws in other areas of the country and Canada but we weren’t able to try them. In the early 1950s, the major US chainsaw manufacturers were Atkins, Bolen, Clinton, David Bradley, Disston, Homelite, I.E.L., Lombard, Mall, Mono, Terril, Titan, Luther, Porter-Cable, Monarch, Woodboss, Fleetwood, Precision, to name a few. Also at that time, the major US chain manufacturers were, Titan, Jamieson, Lynx, Disston, Reed-Prentice, Poulan, Oregon, Atkins, Homelite, I.E.L., McCulluch and Beaver. Homelite finally came out with a great saw, the 2100, 7.2 cubic inch engine, which was the best saw that I ran in the stock class competition. I used it in competition since I was sponsored by Homelite. With it I won the state championship in that class beating out the Stihl 090s. Later the modified 090’s blew all other saws away in the production model class. Of course, Ken Dunn wasn’t around in those days with his expertise either. My Westbend 820, with a Horstman 2” stroker, which made it 10.2 cubic inches, was the fastest in the dual carburetor, piped alcohol class. The other “secret” on the Westbend was a special oil reservoir clutch that allowed the saw to maintain certain pre-determined rpm’s, throughout the cut without going out of the power band. I preferred the full compliment ½” pitch chain with a six tooth sprocket. The rakers were run at .060”. I also used the .404” chain on smaller models but never the 3/8” pitch in my competition years. It wasn’t until the recent years when I started making them for other contestants. I’ve learned a lot about the 3/8” pitch chain and believe they are really fast in smaller logs with smaller engines. With 8 cubic engines and over, I still prefer the ½” pitch chain.
Art Martin
.Art you really should write a book on all your time's out in the bush.
