Thanks. I'm not a quitter; I'm going to try tuning it before i give another company my business. However, I'll say that right now I'm not real happy. It just seems crazy for me to have to spent $1000 on a saw that's not ready to use. I'm fine with maintaining it, but me, the customer, needing to tune a product that German engineers and QC should have ready out of the box for the consumer that just paid $1000 for it, is just plain ridiculous. I have never had to tune a Makita circular saw, drill, belt sander before it did the job. Makita is well known to be the best and IMO they really screwed up here unless I have a lemon. I'm an engineer and that's not how we do things. It makes me mad to think that if I can't fix this on my own, I may need to take a brand new saw and pay more money so that it idles properly and revs to 12,000 - 12,500 like it should. I'm not exactly a rookie with chainsaws. I've been cutting for several years and owned several saws. I don't think a person that's an arborist for a living wants to deal with this kind of stuff either. I'm still thinking I just have a lemon that is going to take a bit more TLC to get running the way the engineers that designed it intended . Trying to be optimistic.
I have nothing against Husqvarna, I own one of their weed wackers and it works well, but if you think about how other parent / child companies are it just makes me wonder what's under the hood and for someone like me, it might make me choose a different brand when there are lots of other options and the tool I'm buying is probably the most dangerous tool there is.
Hooked tachometer up to it and it revs to 12100-12300 range. Idle was indeed set too low so adjusted that, but that won't make it cut any better. It will reduce the annoyance of it cutting off though when letting off the throttle. I wonder if this saw doesn't like the HD filter much. With the cover off it will blow the outer filter cover off and seems like it runs better in the winter setting and with the outer cover filter off. Back to drawing board. So here's where I'm at...sharp chain (throws nice chips when cutting upright, throws dust when on its side), revving to 12200ish, still struggles to pull 32" bar through 22-24" poplar. Have to zig and zag my way through and it takes nearly two tanks of gas for a 10' section. From what I understand about milling a chainsaw should not have to be pushed or zig zagged through the wood. Not sure what else to try.
I believe my 7900 runs at the same, or very close to the same top speed, although it is advertised as 12,800.
I used to fight with getting my chains to bite in end grain milling, and as a heavy guy I just put my back into it and leaned on the sled a lot... I had a guy teach me to sharpen properly & that made a huge difference.
The other difference, and this didn't get put to use until I realized I couldn't push it through very well with broken ribs & a concussion from a bike crash, was a little mechanical crank winch.
Oh my god, that was a lifesaver!!!
Not so much when my chains are perfect, or if I am fresh, but if I mess up a bit on my chain, or want to cut a third slab before sharpening, I can & with far less effort.
as far as tuning a saw goes, I don't even notice I'm doing it sometimes. It is automatic. saw sounds funny? Doesn't run right? Idles funny? Out comes the little screwdriver...it takes very little time, and practically no effort after a while to keep a well known saw in tune.
I do absolutely love the auto tune & M tronics. It does save a little time & I appreciate a machine running 100% all the time, as I go from 600 ft to 4000ft frequently & my grandparents live above the tree line (11,000ft) in CO, and I cut there when there's a load delivered each fall.
Without auto tune, there's absolutely no way a carburetor will compensate for that difference in altitude, and they have zero way of knowing which saw will be at sea level & which saw gets sent to the mountains.
Heck, if I took my saw to the closest saw shop to my grandpa's for a tune, it would be 4700ft of elevation off in the tune & might not even run at his house.
I used to carry 2 carburetors for my chevy when I went out to his house from Kansas & I would swap in denver, or be spitting fuel out my exhaust pipe and having the motor shut off constantly due to flooding it with to high fuel to air.