Nephew didn't put oi in!

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EasyT

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My nephew put in straight gas in my Echo and didn's use the gas can with the oil mixed in. I caught him after he had made only a couple of cuts. You guys think any real damage done? I would think there should have been a little oil in there, enought to prevent any real damage. ANy thoughts, other than shoot the boy? Anything I should do? Thanks.
 
Dump the gas out and fill it with mix. If it has a purge button pump it a bunch of times to circulate fuel from the tank through the carb. Fire it up and let it run for a few minuets so it get some mixed fuel run through it. Id assume it will be fine since you say it wasn't run long.
 
My nephew put in straight gas in my Echo and didn's use the gas can with the oil mixed in. I caught him after he had made only a couple of cuts. You guys think any real damage done? I would think there should have been a little oil in there, enought to prevent any real damage. ANy thoughts, other than shoot the boy? Anything I should do? Thanks.

A couple cuts would be alright as long as they werent huge logs that took a while to get through. Pull the muffler and look at the piston if it was damaged from no oil you would see scoring there.
 
My nephew put in straight gas in my Echo and didn's use the gas can with the oil mixed in. I caught him after he had made only a couple of cuts. You guys think any real damage done? I would think there should have been a little oil in there, enought to prevent any real damage. ANy thoughts, other than shoot the boy? Anything I should do? Thanks.
Perfect! he gets a lesson, and you get a new saw. Its junk, and he gets schooled. Nothing worse than kids without supervision........love to hear his side of this nonsense.
 
Hope the saws alright, I just fried a piston by using old gas and not shaking the can up, running too lean perhaps. Something was not right on my saw.
Nothing like learning the hard way after the saw breaks down and you have to fix it! Hopefully it was just a close call and the saw's okay. I would get a Husqvarna or Jonsered personally! Not a Stihl! Lol...
 
My nephew put in straight gas in my Echo and didn's use the gas can with the oil mixed in. I caught him after he had made only a couple of cuts. You guys think any real damage done? I would think there should have been a little oil in there, enought to prevent any real damage. ANy thoughts, other than shoot the boy? Anything I should do? Thanks.
Bang your head on a door facing 10 times for not watching him closer. Pull the muffler and look for any damage. If there is any, fix it together with him. It will be a great learning experience for him and a bit of bonding for you both. JMHO


Mike
 
Like others have said, pull the muffler and look for vertical score marks on the piston. If there aren’t any, go buy a lottery ticket. If there is you really should pull the cylinder and look for aluminum transfer on the plating. If there’s transfer and you continue to run the saw it’s eventuality gonna stick the ring and then you’ll HAVE to take it apart. Or buy a new saw.
 
Firstly, dont let anyone near your tools. But now it's too late I would just run it as you normally do until it dies. If it were a husqvarna I would strip it and make sure it was 100% but everyone is different. Hope your nephew has learnt his lesson
 
Firstly, dont let anyone near your tools. But now it's too late I would just run it as you normally do until it dies. If it were a husqvarna I would strip it and make sure it was 100% but everyone is different. Hope your nephew has learnt his lesson

That's why everyone should have a <$25 Wild Thingy they got at a garage sale for a loaner saw, and a 1-gal can of mix/quart of bar oil.

1 wild thingy.png
 
Back in my snowmachine days, I stuck a lot of pistons and I found out, if the cylinder wasn't too bad (aluminum transfer), you could get the 'smear' off the cylinder walls using easy off oven cleaner as it causes the aluminum transfer to let loose. We always ran then real lean for power.
 
If you are just a casual homeowner user I would just dump the gas out, refill it with proper mix, and see how it runs. I wouldn’t even pull the muffler. If it doesn’t start or won’t run well you will probably have to replace the piston at least, but maybe not the cylinder. Echo parts are cheap, and if you are mechanically inclined you can do the work yourself. Just google ”chainsaw cylinder replacement” on the internet and there are hundreds of videos. It really is pretty easy to do.
if you take it to a dealer he will want to replace everything and when he throws his labor on top of parts it will almost certainly come out close to what a new saw cost so you have nothing to loose.
As for your nephew you will have to figure that out 🤨
 
That's why everyone should have a <$25 Wild Thingy they got at a garage sale for a loaner saw, and a 1-gal can of mix/quart of bar oil.

View attachment 1087729
That was a great thing to have on hand 15 years ago when you could pick them up to $20.00 and put $10.00 worth of fuel lines and a carb kit in them. Now people want big money for that garbage at junk sales.I don't keep loaners around anymore for this very reason.
 
Pull the plug, put some 2 stroke oil down the hole, and a squirt of fogging oil. Let it sit a couple of days. Pull the cord a couple of times, and let it sit a day or two. Put some fresh mix in it that is closer to 32 to 1 ratio, but not a full tank. ( think break in mix). Although we usually think of the pistons and rings as being the first casualty of straight gas, it's also the bearings and crank that take a beating.
If it starts , runs, and idles... well, just think of it like a car, that someone just magically put an extra 100,000 miles on. it just got a lot older real fast.

You said you caught him after he'd made a "couple of cuts".. Define cuts? A couple of 6 inch cuts? 60 seconds or less of running time? How did you catch that? Sound? Saw the wrong can ( straight gas) had been moved?

Also depends on whether or not he ran it dry, or was just a low on fuel, and he topped it off. If it was just low ... there would have been at least some oil still in the mix it was running.
 
Another way to look at it is if someone isnt competent enough to do the basics like sharpen and tune a saw then maybe they shouldn't be let loose with a saw. If they cant mix the correct fuel to oil ratio or dont even know about it they definitely shouldn't be near a saw. It's a serious accident just waiting to happen. Education is the key, no one is ever too old to learn.
 
Another way to look at it is if someone isnt competent enough to do the basics like sharpen and tune a saw then maybe they shouldn't be let loose with a saw. If they cant mix the correct fuel to oil ratio or dont even know about it they definitely shouldn't be near a saw. It's a serious accident just waiting to happen. Education is the key, no one is ever too old to learn.
An excellent post!! Not a wasted word, many aspects covered. " basics like sharpen and tune a saw then maybe they shouldn't be let loose with a saw."

That being said, sharpening a saw blade isn't necessarily the dark art it used to be. I've sharpened, literally, thousands of chains. Then I found the Stihl "2 in 1" sharpener. It'll crisp up a chain in three to five strokes, after every tank. And, it sets the rakers ( depth gauges) at the same time. Sure, I could do a bit better by hand.. but for the mindless simplicity of the 2 in 1 ... I'm in! Tuning ( for a youngster ) should be left to "Yoda" , with the Padiwan watching and asking questions. It's a learning curve. Twenty years in, It's still a skill, that I'm good at, but have not completely mastered.

Correct fuel to oil ratio? Oh Hell yeah! That's basic math.. moving decimal points etc. The inability of a millennial to be able to figure out 50 to 1 in any format ( liters .. quarts, Imperial, US ounces), is a horrible commentary on our educational system.

"It's a serious accident just waiting to happen." I've personally never understood how any person could walk into any store and buy a 100 CC saw.. no license, no training, no nothing. Effin incredible that that exists. You need ,( at least where I live), a license to Hunt, buy a gun ( of any kind). But.. "Here sir, Here's your saw" ..... No requirements.. My first saw was an Echo CS 400.. I learned from YouTube.. I was very.. very ...very lucky..
 
An excellent post!! Not a wasted word, many aspects covered. " basics like sharpen and tune a saw then maybe they shouldn't be let loose with a saw."

That being said, sharpening a saw blade isn't necessarily the dark art it used to be. I've sharpened, literally, thousands of chains. Then I found the Stihl "2 in 1" sharpener. It'll crisp up a chain in three to five strokes, after every tank. And, it sets the rakers ( depth gauges) at the same time. Sure, I could do a bit better by hand.. but for the mindless simplicity of the 2 in 1 ... I'm in! Tuning ( for a youngster ) should be left to "Yoda" , with the Padiwan watching and asking questions. It's a learning curve. Twenty years in, It's still a skill, that I'm good at, but have not completely mastered.

Correct fuel to oil ratio? Oh Hell yeah! That's basic math.. moving decimal points etc. The inability of a millennial to be able to figure out 50 to 1 in any format ( liters .. quarts, Imperial, US ounces), is a horrible commentary on our educational system.

"It's a serious accident just waiting to happen." I've personally never understood how any person could walk into any store and buy a 100 CC saw.. no license, no training, no nothing. Effin incredible that that exists. You need ,( at least where I live), a license to Hunt, buy a gun ( of any kind). But.. "Here sir, Here's your saw" ..... No requirements.. My first saw was an Echo CS 400.. I learned from YouTube.. I was very.. very ...very lucky..

darwin principle.png1 fish.png
 
Bang your head on a door facing 10 times for not watching him closer. Pull the muffler and look for any damage. If there is any, fix it together with him. It will be a great learning experience for him and a bit of bonding for you both. JMHO


Mike
Now this is about the best advice a man can give. It's almost Jesus-like, if Jesus had an Echo. My understanding is he preferred Stihl.
 
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