Caved and bought a MS230

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thrustie

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Well, I recently got into some felling lately as I have quite a bit of wooded area on my property and doing some development. Shop, bigger driveway, etc, and all of which has forced me into some clearing. Anyways, I have been using a mid sized saw and just been getting tired trimming brush and small stuff in between the big stuff CAD is already kicked in. I really enjoy cutting. I find it almost like therapy to me :) I ended up purchasing a basic MS230. I am in Ontario and Stihl currently has most of their saws on sale and include that woods package so I picked it up. So far I am really liking it. Starts so easy and has a decent amount of power. Most importantly, it is very light compared to my other saw. Anyways else have any experience with the 230? It appears the 210, 230, and 250 are all very similar? I was at first going to go with the 180, but it was only 40 dollars less and 9ccs smaller so I figured the 230 was the better buy. The dealer also threw in the a set of chaps at half price which was alright :)

Question for you gurus out there. How long roughly does it take for the saw to break in? I noticed they set the saw pretty rich for breakin. It runs very nice, but I can tell she is brand new and still very tight(often getting stuck in small wood because it just doesn't have the torque) It's amazing the difference between a broken in saw and a new one lol.

Thanks everyone for reading. Any comments, suggestions, tips, etc more than welcome. Just thought I'd share my exciting day :)

Kyle
 
Well, I figured I would tackle a rather larger tree than what I ever planned to with my new MS230 this evening and it very much surprised me. I had a decent size willow tree(18" or so) that I needed to fell as I didn't want it covering my new garage in its crap that it sheads and/or possibly destroying my foundation from its shallow roots. We have bedrock at 12" where I am located and this thing had massive roots going into the hole where my garage will soon be.

Anyways, I was very surprised at how well it notched the larger tree and easily took it down afterwards. It wasn't as quick as my 361 is of course, but I figured it would have more difficulty than it did. It did get stuck a few times, but it was mainly when I re-entered my cut without being on the throttle at all. (the chain would instantly grab the wood and it just doesn't have the torque like my 361 to start ripping through). All in all, I really love the power to weight ration of this saw. It has a pretty decent amount of power(would love to mod it, but really don't want to void the warrantee just incase), balanced great, and very low vibration. I think my favourite part about this saw though is just how quite this thing is. My 361 is LOUD, LOUD, LOUD with the muffler mod and just screams like a hyianna which is nice and all, but I love just going out and tinkering around in the woods with a quite lil saw also :)

Could anyone give me a rough idea of how long I should expect before the saw is broken in and gets a bit more torquey? The dealer set it quite rich and said once it feels broken in just to lean it out a bit. Thanks in advance,

Kyle
 
No ones interested in the MS230 :( I have done a bit of searching through the forums and have read some pretty aweful reviews on it for the most part. Anyone have experience with one?

So far it seems to be doing great. About 6 tanks run through it so far and its starting to wake up quite a bit as the cylinder gets broken in a bit. I have been reading that these saws have bad issues with flooding? Any truth to this? So far it has not flood on me once yet, but I am very careful with my use of choke and when I shut it off.

Kyle
 
I have an 023L, the 230's older brother. The "L" makes it a pretty rare saw, but otherwise it is a standard 023. Not a bad saw, but with the muffling on mine, it is about MS-180 power levels. Just keep the chain sharp, and the oiler holes clean. The 1123 saws have never been known for being heavy oilers. Otherwise, it is a nice homeowner saw that will work for years without a complaint. Keep an eye on the air filter snaps as they ALWAYS break off. Crank seals are about 8 year items on these, and fuel lines probably go about 5.
 
Do you have the carbide chain setup? Around here, the 230 is only sold with the carbide setup, so they move very few of them. Most of the volume goes to its big brother, the 250. They are nice light saws for the smaller jobs. It should wake up some more once you get some more tanks through it and retune it. I think you will be happy with it.
 
It sure would be nice to hear a little more on the MS230 from others - I bought mine only because of the carbide chain and the fact that I'd be using it to clear fence line and an old pasture field full of scrubb trees. I've ran over 2 gallon through it and the carbide chain still cuts fine even though it spends a fair amount of time in the dirt at the base of scrubb trees. I guess it is too new or no serious saw user has a place for one of these in their arsenal. I sure hope it holds up well as I have found myself setting the 064 and 359 down in favor of this little guy. Works great removing limbs in place of the 359 and if the tree isn't too large - I just keep on rolling with the ms230. It seems to cross over into the low end of the 359 territory for me, but then the 359 crosses over into the low end of the 064 territory as well. The 359 could do it all, but it sure is nice having a good saw on either side of it.
 
blsnelling said:
Carbide chain on a 230?
Click to expand...

Stihl is pushing the carbide for homeowners as they stay sharp much longer. Probably the result of surveys or market study info... On thier sawchain webpage they have this line...

This may be the LAST saw chain you'll ever buy. Watch the video now!
Click to expand...

Which links to a video (or is supposed, but it won't load for me).


dw
 
Last edited:
The muff screen on that series likes to clog up easy, either check it every 20 hours or so or toss it. If your cutting on state land etc it's required and if really dry out could start a fire without it.. It will help if you don't let your saw idle too much. Steve
 

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