Nathan Graff
ArboristSite Operative
When mixing oil, you must be very very careful. If it's not exactly 50:1, your saw will self detonate. This also means that your oil must be at the same temperature as your gas when measuring it. Otherwise it'll throw your ratios out of whack, and the saw will die a horrible death. If you want that for your poor saw, send that poor Stihl to me for proper use, and go but a home depot echo.
Kidding.
In all seriousness though, I'm not terribly concerned about that though. I am picky on the gas I use though. I'll only use Shell premium, and I fill my jerry can after I fill my car with premium. (It's a European car and gets the best cost to miles driven on premium as of my last calculations.) I put stabilizer and about an eighth of a can of seafoam into it, and have used that gas a year after I've mixed it. Runs just fine. I have tried Stihl full synthetic, and I didn't like the smell of it, and it carboned up my stuff. I switched to Amsoil Sabre at about 50:1, which is the only other full synthetic oil readily available to me, and had no more carboning problem. It seemed to clean up the carboning that I did have.
The 4 mix units don't like the carboning that seems to happen with the stihl oil, and seem to run better with the amsoil. I bought a used one that a guy couldn't get to run, adjusted the valves, took the spark arrestor out, and got it going and ran it on a rack hard with some steam being pumped into the intake. It puked all kinds of nasty carbon out of it. Had to take the muffler off and bake it to get the carbon out. Also had to adjust the valves after cleaning the engine. Through the spark plug hole before and after was a major change. Before, the piston was just nasty in the amount of carbon coating. After, It was almost factory new clean. It runs great since.
I've been alternating the stihl synthetic and the amsoil to use up the pack of stihl oil that I bought. As of right now, once it's done, I won't be buying any more stihl oil until they change it, then I'll give it another try.
Kidding.
In all seriousness though, I'm not terribly concerned about that though. I am picky on the gas I use though. I'll only use Shell premium, and I fill my jerry can after I fill my car with premium. (It's a European car and gets the best cost to miles driven on premium as of my last calculations.) I put stabilizer and about an eighth of a can of seafoam into it, and have used that gas a year after I've mixed it. Runs just fine. I have tried Stihl full synthetic, and I didn't like the smell of it, and it carboned up my stuff. I switched to Amsoil Sabre at about 50:1, which is the only other full synthetic oil readily available to me, and had no more carboning problem. It seemed to clean up the carboning that I did have.
The 4 mix units don't like the carboning that seems to happen with the stihl oil, and seem to run better with the amsoil. I bought a used one that a guy couldn't get to run, adjusted the valves, took the spark arrestor out, and got it going and ran it on a rack hard with some steam being pumped into the intake. It puked all kinds of nasty carbon out of it. Had to take the muffler off and bake it to get the carbon out. Also had to adjust the valves after cleaning the engine. Through the spark plug hole before and after was a major change. Before, the piston was just nasty in the amount of carbon coating. After, It was almost factory new clean. It runs great since.
I've been alternating the stihl synthetic and the amsoil to use up the pack of stihl oil that I bought. As of right now, once it's done, I won't be buying any more stihl oil until they change it, then I'll give it another try.
