Swelled Cylinder ?

[cedarshark]

I stopped by my Stihl dealership this morning to order a piston for a BG 56C Stihl leaf blower that has been straight gassed. No aftermarket pistons are made to my knowledge for this machine. The mechanic told me I am spinning my wheels cleaning the cylinder and replacing piston/rings because when a 2 cycle is straight-gassed it "swells" the cylinder making it unusable. After rebuilding over 30 saws last year with scored pistons/cylinders....I laughed and asked him if this was the company response in order to sell piston & cylinder sets instead of individual components. He got a little peeved and said he was taught this in "tech school". Has anyone ever seen or heard of a "swelled cylinder" ?

 

[watsonr]

It'd have to get pretty darn hot, like 1200+ degrees to change shape drastically. I suppose a small change could happen, but like you, have never had one yet.

 

[nstueve]

nope... never heard of swelled cylinders before. :msp_confused:

 

[nstueve]

It'd have to get pretty darn hot, like 1200+ degrees to change shape drastically. I suppose a small change could happen, but like you, have never had one yet.

Speaking of cylinders the AM ms260 cylinder is at Shaun's and we started on the port timing. Not sure where we left off but Shaun has a 026 stock and a bare crankcase to mount the new one too. He said numbers were not ideal but they were good enough for a good builder to use them for porting. I'll push to get a thread together on that cylinder; I know you've been waiting on it for a while now!

 

[dozerdan]

It must have gotten some water on the end grain and swelled it. They should have used gasket in a tube to seal it. LOL

I once stopped at an old Echo dealer and asked the man behind to counter if they had any of the old Echo 610 two cylinder saws around.
He told he that he had plenty of them and that all of the Echo saws are two cylinders, you have to mix oil in with the gas.

Good help is hard to find.

Later
Dan

 

[tpope]

Be sure to carry the old piston with you when you go to pickup the new one...

I am unsure that the individual you spoke with is capable of using a catalog correctly. You need to compare pistons...

 

[cedarshark]

It'd have to get pretty darn hot, like 1200+ degrees to change shape drastically. I suppose a small change could happen, but like you, have never had one yet.

Not to mention the fact that a blower only runs at 7200 RPM max...half of what a saw runs. I dont think a blower could hit 1200 degrees straight gassed at full throttle. I think I am having exhaust blown up my tailpipe...

 

[qbilder]

It may swell while running, but will return to original shape once cool.

 

[cedarshark]

It must have gotten some water on the end grain and swelled it. They should have used gasket in a tube to seal it. LOL

I once stopped at an old Echo dealer and asked the man behind to counter if they had any of the old Echo 610 two cylinder saws around.
He told he that he had plenty of them and that all of the Echo saws are two cylinders, you have to mix oil in with the gas.

Good help is hard to find.

Later
Dan

I would like to have one of those 610s as well.

 

[Frogfarmer]

I have been to several factory Certification classes and updates. Some were very good and understood the problems the techs saw on a daily basis. Others were just teachers passing along curriculum they had been given. I have enough certificates to cover a 10'X10' wall but to be honest most of the classes gave little more than the basic info any tech will learn in the first couple years in the shop. Real world hands on experience has no equal when it comes to equipment service and repair. Due to the cost these days most shops do very little repair and choose to replace any suspect parts.

 

[Isna]

I have been to several factory Certification classes and updates. Some were very good and understood the problems the techs saw on a daily basis. Others were just teachers passing along curriculum they had been given. I have enough certificates to cover a 10'X10' wall but to be honest most of the classes gave little more than the basic info any tech will learn in the first couple years in the shop. Real world hands on experience has no equal when it comes to equipment service and repair. Due to the cost these days most shops do very little repair and choose to replace any suspect parts.

I went for a mech training at French Stihl headquarters 2 years ago, with one of our crew members (who usually fixes our trucks). I learned nothing new. They just taught us to buy and replace every suspect parts. I remember arguing about carb rebuilt: Their policy was to change the whole carb no matter what the problem was. They where always coming up with potential complications to defend their point of view. Change it all and don't bother... At least, I let our employee do all the mech since he was not used to working on chainsaws and had more to learn.

 

[Fish]

Most of the classes I ever went to were basic, so I never learned much. The last thing that I was at that resembled a class was a tv show
put on by the Stihl rep and a tech guy. We watched videos of guys working on new Stihl saws wearing thick leather gloves for protection,
they got mad when I laughed about it.

Our shop sent a couple of guys to "Gold" school. All of the KY reps borrowed tools from all over the state, so the dealership could build
the UBER-SHOP, and qualify for the guys to acheive the Gold level. I thought great, we can get out of the broom closet to work on stuff.

No, the UBER-Shop was dismantled immediately after the school was over. The tools returned to the other shops, our shop woldn't waste the money to get them.........

The two guys that got sent to the school, one was the top ZTR tech, the other was the brother-in-law of the owner, who never worked on much anymore, just on the clock getting a check, as was the sister. He was a good mechanic, just retired.

I asked why you don't let the guys that work on the Stihls go to the school, naw, you all need to keep working....In your closet......

 

[Isna]

Most of the classes I ever went to were basic, so I never learned much. The last thing that I was at that resembled a class was a tv show
put on by the Stihl rep and a tech guy. We watched videos of guys working on new Stihl saws wearing thick leather gloves for protection,
they got mad when I laughed about it.

Our shop sent a couple of guys to "Gold" school. All of the KY reps borrowed tools from all over the state, so the dealership could build
the UBER-SHOP, and qualify for the guys to acheive the Gold level. I thought great, we can get out of the broom closet to work on stuff.

No, the UBER-Shop was dismantled immediately after the school was over. The tools returned to the other shops, our shop woldn't waste the money to get them.........

The two guys that got sent to the school, one was the top ZTR tech, the other was the brother-in-law of the owner, who never worked on much anymore, just on the clock getting a check, as was the sister. He was a good mechanic, just retired.

I asked why you don't let the guys that work on the Stihls go to the school, naw, you all need to keep working....In your closet......

I don't know how it works in the States but, here, it is really hard to get a Stihl training if you're not a dealer. They don't want companies to fix their equipment themselves.We got one of our dealers to recommend us but it failed. We then got an other dealer pretend that he wanted to hire us and we finally managed to get on the training. I was chosen since I'm the only team manager to have CAD (Thanks to AS) and therefore was already spending all my rainy days fixing saws (We are in the city that is known as the one getting the less rainy days in the whole country). i had to fight to convince my boss to also train one of the crew members. He chose our truck mech because he's a good friend of him, although he never touched a chainsaw. When he had no trucks to fix, he helped out on the woodworking crew. Unfortunately, he also had a serious ATV accident last summer and hasn't been able to work since. I end up being the only one able to fix our 26 chainsaws but have no time to do it since I already work extra hours with my assigned work. Wish we could have more crew members follow a "serious" Stihl training.

 

[Fish]

Yes, it is sad. These places seriously need good techs to fix saws, but do not recognize that fixing saws is extremely difficult, and do not take care of the employees that can fix the saws.

At the dealership I was referring to, the kid that worked on Honda pushmowers only made more than I did, he couldn't do any other simple
function in the business, but he was hell on Honda pushmowers. These pushmowers were $700 plus new, the Stihl guys were buried in the $149 trimmers. Any repair done at that dealership averaged over $100 minimum....

 

[zogger]

I stopped by my Stihl dealership this morning to order a piston for a BG 56C Stihl leaf blower that has been straight gassed. No aftermarket pistons are made to my knowledge for this machine. The mechanic told me I am spinning my wheels cleaning the cylinder and replacing piston/rings because when a 2 cycle is straight-gassed it "swells" the cylinder making it unusable. After rebuilding over 30 saws last year with scored pistons/cylinders....I laughed and asked him if this was the company response in order to sell piston & cylinder sets instead of individual components. He got a little peeved and said he was taught this in "tech school". Has anyone ever seen or heard of a "swelled cylinder" ?

Technically, the cylinder coated with transferred aluminum could be considered to have swelled beyond factory specs. Kinda sorta in a way. The word doesnt fit, but....narrowed is more accurate. It would measure narrower diameter to some amount, and for sure a new piston wouldnt fit well nor run well putting it in there as is.

but ya, the tech there is a doo doo head.

 

[blsnelling]

These places... do not recognize that fixing saws is extremely difficult...

???

 

[3000 FPS]

The piston and cylinder would have grooves in it before the cylinder swelled. I have cleaned up plenty of cylinders on scored pistons and cylinders and when done I was still able to get 180 psi out of them. I have some bore gauges here maybe on the next scored cylinder I tear into I will take a few reading to get rid of the smell of BS.

 

[Isna]

Yes, it is sad. These places seriously need good techs to fix saws, but do not recognize that fixing saws is extremely difficult, and do not take care of the employees that can fix the saws.

At the dealership I was referring to, the kid that worked on Honda pushmowers only made more than I did, he couldn't do any other simple
function in the business, but he was hell on Honda pushmowers. These pushmowers were $700 plus new, the Stihl guys were buried in the $149 trimmers. Any repair done at that dealership averaged over $100 minimum....

It might not be worth spending money on training to repair $149 trimmers. Nevertheless, saws are expensive around here ($2400 for a MS880) and the dealers get the same training I got, worthless...
I knew a place where they had a good saw mech. They were slow but did a good job because they had the right guy. They had no care for him and he ended up leaving... Was replaced by one of these guys claiming that cylinders swell and that you need to buy a new saw.
An old friend told me that his local dealer claimed his MS290 was beyond fixing. He will drop it off this WE. I am sure I can get it back to work for $100 max. Dealers don't bother fixing anymore: they just want to sell.

 

[Fish]

???

Compared to fixing lawn mowers.....


Sorry.......

 

[Racerboy832]

Just out of curiosity what are PE techs making these days. When I graduate motorcycle Mechanic school I went from 14 to 28 by the time I was 25. Now the current kids are getting 12-14 an hour. Once I reached 28 there was no way to get any higher whether I was 25 or 65...