Bill I have both the 241 and 261.. I used the 241 for cutting some pretty big stuff. Granted a bigger saw would have been better but the 241 is a cuttin sum of beech. The lighter weight of the 241 makes it fun to use for us old farts. How' the foot healing Bill?
My point is how does it do a better job than a 026/260/261. If the 241 is the greastest damm thing since sliced bread there has to be a reason. If they were such a great saw over the 261 then Stihl would be selling the hell out of them and the supply would be out there. Nobody would be on the internet looking for them.
Steve the feet are healing slowly but surely. I still cannot wear shoes. I was able to get a pair of jeans on Wednesday. That is the first in a month. I hope to cut a bit Sunday.
I think there was to narrow of a market for the 241 for the price at the time. The 261 wasn't that much more and guys could put a 16" bar on it to use as a limbing saw.
Looks like 10.3 lbs for the 241 and 11.6 for the 261. Powerhead dry weight.
That is basically the point I was trying to make. I hear guys talk about "limbing" saws. I always wonder just what size a tree they are cutting that they limb it with a saw running a 14' bar and picco chain. I used to keep a few 3/8LP saws around but I just got fed up with them. The 026/260/261 is the perfect small saw. I has has a HUGE advantage over the 241 in that it uses a 12mm bar ans standard 3/8 chain. I can take a 026, 034. 440, and 660 with me. All those saws run the same 20" bar with the same 72Dl chain. All I need is a few spare 72DL chains in case I rock out one on ANY of the saws. I see you said the 241 was 20.8 ounces lighter than a 261. Lets just think about that.....20,8 oz is a bottle of soda. My personal opinion is those few ounces are nothing compared to running a superior saw. Of course to each their own and we all are different. That is what makes the world go round.
Yes a few ounces doesn't matter most of the time. The 2 saws I have been running mostly as of late are the 261 and 400. The 400 gets the log end and then pick up the 261 for the limbs. About 1.2 lbs. difference between the 2 . I do run a 16" 3/8 picco on the 241. T he only short bar I ever ran was a 10" on my first saw.That is basically the point I was trying to make. I hear guys talk about "limbing" saws. I always wonder just what size a tree they are cutting that they limb it with a saw running a 14' bar and picco chain. I used to keep a few 3/8LP saws around but I just got fed up with them. The 026/260/261 is the perfect small saw. I has has a HUGE advantage over the 241 in that it uses a 12mm bar ans standard 3/8 chain. I can take a 026, 034. 440, and 660 with me. All those saws run the same 20" bar with the same 72Dl chain. All I need is a few spare 72DL chains in case I rock out one on ANY of the saws. I see you said the 241 was 20.8 ounces lighter than a 261. Lets just think about that.....20,8 oz is a bottle of soda. My personal opinion is those few ounces are nothing compared to running a superior saw. Of course to each their own and we all are different. That is what makes the world go round.
I echo your thinking on having a starndard chain to use across several saws, that certainly adds a lot of value to your sawing activities, and hence your questioning the value of the picco bar/chain setup. And it makes perfect sense to me why you run the saws that you have described.That is basically the point I was trying to make. I hear guys talk about "limbing" saws. I always wonder just what size a tree they are cutting that they limb it with a saw running a 14' bar and picco chain. I used to keep a few 3/8LP saws around but I just got fed up with them. The 026/260/261 is the perfect small saw. I has has a HUGE advantage over the 241 in that it uses a 12mm bar ans standard 3/8 chain. I can take a 026, 034. 440, and 660 with me. All those saws run the same 20" bar with the same 72Dl chain. All I need is a few spare 72DL chains in case I rock out one on ANY of the saws. I see you said the 241 was 20.8 ounces lighter than a 261. Lets just think about that.....20,8 oz is a bottle of soda. My personal opinion is those few ounces are nothing compared to running a superior saw. Of course to each their own and we all are different. That is what makes the world go round.
Whether it is significant or marginal, I don't know..., but any potential benefit of the narrow bar/chain is likely to be much less in operational value than the "shared chain" advantage that you describe in your post.
The only "testing " we have done was comparing 3/8lp to .325 on a MS 250. Another member here had the .325 on his and thought the saw sucked. We put on a 3/8lp on it and he said it was a totally different saw. All my 60 cc and above saws run 3/8. 50 cc are .325 and less than 50cc are the 3/8lp. Like you said, the narrower chain has less friction in the cut IMO.I echo your thinking on having a starndard chain to use across several saws, that certainly adds a lot of value to your sawing activities, and hence your questioning the value of the picco bar/chain setup. And it makes perfect sense to me why you run the saws that you have described.
My expectation is that the narrow bar has a smaller surface area for the chain to run on, so there is slightly less drag/friction between the bar and chain than with wider bars, and the narrower chain has to cut less width of wood in the "cut", so it requires less power to cut through a log compared to a wider chain/bar. Hence giving some logic to the "performance" and "appeal" of the 241 that we read about.
I don't have any proof of the difference in cutting performance of different bar/chain widths with comparison testing, but I am sure someone here on this forum has done some testing...
like now 
Congrats!
