HiPA chain review

Arborist Forum

Help Support Arborist Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
I avoid all Chinese stuff if I can, no matter what. Just because it's cheap don't matter to me. Besides, I buy bulk rolls of Oregon chain and make up my own loops.

Getting so the only thing made in this country are babies and even they are delivered with Chinese surgical tools.

The way it's going, pretty soon we will be eating raw fish with chopsticks.
 
I received the hipa file guide today. It said 3 piece set. You actually get 4 files, guide and handle. It doesn't have a brand name on it anywhere. It is identical to the Trilink brand one I have. It isn't branded either. I touched up a Husqvarna chain with it and it did a pretty good job. It's not a super aggressive file but it did make visible filings and I could feel it cutting. For 4.98 delivered, I think it's a win.
 

Attachments

  • 20230615_152058.jpg
    20230615_152058.jpg
    2.5 MB · Views: 0
I picked up one of those full chisel (.325) chains at tractor supply. Looks like a decent chain! Doesn`t have any anti-kickback links in it. Its very sharp. I`m not going to waste my time drawing a file across the teeth. We`ll find out over the weekend how it cuts. I believe its made in chynaw. How long it will last will be the factor if i buy anymore of them, or not. We`ll see!
 
UPDATE: (Tractor Supply) County Line .325 Full chisel chain.
Looking the chain over, it looks alot like the Stihl .325 23RS-C (no anti-kick links in the chain)

I tried it out today. It immediately stretched out. It was pretty loose after firing up the saw and throttling it up a few times just to get the oil flowing. Got it tightened back up, stayed tight after that. Definitely NOT a pre-stretched chain by any means. The teeth on it are alot wider than the regular .325 homeowner chains. I forgot to measure the width of the teeth, so i`ll do that tomorrow to see how much wider these full chisel teeth are compared to the standard oregon .325 chain`s. I noticed its not a round tooth design either, its a square cut tooth.

Going into the cut, i expected it to grab hard. It did not. Through the cut, it is fast, alot faster than the regular chains! Saw didn`t bog down nearly as much as i thought it would, given the size of the teeth are bigger. If these chains hold up decent, i`ll buy more of them. It cut clean and fast, and straight. The question remains, its a chyneeze chain, how long it lasts, will be the question. Also, when i re-sharpen it, that should tell me more about the chain as well.
 
I've been using one that came on a Farmertec 58cc saw for about a week now, filed it for the first time yesterday; 3/8 full chisel. It has cut about 2 cords of alder and birch--birch 24" at the butt--very nicely. What I found when filing it is that they ground the top angle very shallow, making the chain cut very nicely at the expense of fairly easy chipping of the cutter due to the top cutting edge being so thin. Other than that it felt 'normal' when filing.

I'd get another if cheap, but I'd file before using to get more thickness to the tops of the cutters.

A week isn't much, but so far the saw is flawless; I got it just to see what they are like for C$264, with 20" bar and chain, plus $31 import charges.
 
I've got a few loops of the 8ten chain I'm trying out. So far seems to be good chain.
There is a decent amount of stretch in the initial 15 or 20 minutes of run time but doesn't stretch much after that.
Seems to cut quickly and hold an edge as well as anything else.
I've been mostly cutting maple and ash with it.
 
We had a really good chance to bury that "County Line - Tractor Supply" Full Chisel in some big fresh wood today with the new Echo CS-4910. Its on its first tank of Red Armor gas. The saw feels lazy. (yes, i did tune the carb) By the time the tank got closer to empty, you could feel it starting to perk up. The chain stayed tight, huge chips, BUT, the (pro) full chisel chain is to much on the saw right now. It was pretty grabby most of the time. We`re going to switch it back to the original .325 semi-chisel. Maybe later on after the saw loosens up a little, we might re-visit the full chisel again. For the time being though, we`ll stick with the .325 semi-chisel.
 
Back
Top