Weedeater blower (piston pictures)

[Boogedy_Man]

I've got an old weedeater blower that I've had for 10 years or so. I've run the "P" out of it clearing mountain bike trails....sometimes a dozen tanks in a row of nonstop use (minus refueling) in the heat of the Carolina summers. She still runs like a banshee.

One day I flooded it, had a temper tantrum and went straight to the Stihl dealer and bought a 56c for the house. Came home and the weedeater fired right up and has been flawless since. I think the only thing I've done in 10 years is once or twice clean the air filter..." I think" means I may have only done it once.

Anyway, long story short I've been trying to collect some decent equipment the past couple years and am trying to learn a little more about maintenance. The only troubles I've generally had with anything in recent years is the fuel. Since buying ethanol free and running good oil those problems are all but gone.

So on the weedeater blower, I pulled the exhaust off today. The piston looks like hell! Holy moly...I don't even know how this is still running!

Is this thing on its last 10 minutes of life or is it just me? What in the world could I have done to cabuse this? Just worn out? Wrong oil? I don't want my better equipment to end up like this, so any suggestions are appreciated!

 

[Conquistador3]

I don't know how much you paid for this thing, but my advice would be not to worry and run it until it seizes, then simply throw it away. Not only it has already paid itself many times over, but after a decade it's likely spare parts have long disappeared. If they ever existed.

As per causes of said piston damage... extremely hard to say. There could be an air leak somewhere, it could have been run on bad premix at some point in the past with the damage getting progressively worse (I've seen it happen on an old Suzuki two stroke), overheating from running too lean... I honestly wouldn't worry too much about it.
If you use the correct premix, clean the spark arrest screen at regular intervals and replace the air filter and spark plug when needed, you've done everything that you could.

 

[Team FAST]

The answer to me is obvious.....debris from not cleaning the air filter. And possibly some heat induced wear. What kind of oil and ratio did you run?

 

[Boogedy_Man]

Conquistador - No intentions whatsoever in fixing it. I was just surprised to see the piston when it seems to run so well, and curious how abnormal this was and what might have caused it.

Fast - Noted. I always secretly wanted the thing to die just to get the piece of green equipment out of my shed. I've ran all the wrong oil the whole time I owned it. TCW-3 the entire 10 years or so at 40:1. All my other equipment runs Husqvarna Synthetic, but have Trufuel in everything now as we head into winter.

 

[Conquistador3]

If it's like the Suzuki engine I spoke of, it will take quite a while to kill the thing!

 

[Boogedy_Man]

Well...I think I figured it out. Pulled off the air cleaner cover and half the filter is gone. There'a not much of filter to begin with, so I'm guess it got dirty and sucked right through the engine. If that happened the last time I cleaned the trails then it was running in a dirt clouds the whole time.

 

[Team FAST]

Well...I think I figured it out. Pulled off the air cleaner cover and half the filter is gone. There'a not much of filter to begin with, so I'm guess it got dirty and sucked right through the engine. If that happened the last time I cleaned the trails then it was running in a dirt clouds the whole time.

Bingo. Exactly like I said. FOD is the number one killer of engines.

TCW3 spec oil didn't help either.

 

[Boogedy_Man]

Yeah, you called it for sure. I'm just learning about oil to be honest. I remembered as a kid all the manuals for 2 strokes said use 30 weight if you had to...so I always figured it wasn't that critical as long as the ratio was good.

I ran anything and everything - even used engine oil - in my old single cylinder snowmobiles from the 60s and 70s. Never had any engine problems whatsoever. We'd sometimes get sleds from people's back yards with seized motors, soak the piston in kerosene and beat on it with a block of wood to get it moving. After a carb refresh and cleaning the rust of the clutch pulleys we'd be running them by afternoon...crap oil, stale gas and all.

I'm learning that's far from the case with new high revving stuff. I'm sticking with good quality synthetics for all the new stuff.

 

[Boogedy_Man]

It's worth noting, too, this thing had the most worthless air filter one could ever see. Just a little foam ring. Glad all my new stuff is much better designed.

 

[Team FAST]

My opinions on oil:

Best lubricity: degummed castor
Best (cleanest) castor: Maxima 927

Best synthetic: Redline two stroke racing oil

4 to 4.5 oz/gal.

Your mileage may vary, and I'm sure this will be controversial, but my opinions are formed over 10 years of competitively road racing shifter karts with engine development, successes, failures, and dyno tuning to back it up.

 

[Boogedy_Man]

Good deal. That stuff is a bit pricey, but I guess not a huge deal in the grand scheme of things. I'll probably buy a 16oz'er off Amazon and see how it goes.

Just got my carb tools in today and got all my little motors dialed in. Never knew there were so many RPMs in these little motors, boy they really scream like hell now!

Just kidding, of course. Everything was actually very lean as set up from the factory. I dialed in the highs so that at no load it's just on the cusp of 4 stroking, and adjusted the lows to idle smooth and respond well to throttle input. Hopefully I'm in the ballpark, but if not at least everything is a tad richer than it was out of the box.

 

[Conquistador3]

It's worth noting, too, this thing had the most worthless air filter one could ever see. Just a little foam ring. Glad all my new stuff is much better designed.

It sounds like the air filter on my Zenoah hedge trimmer. You'd expect on something with that sticker price Husqvarna would put a slightly better air filter...
Still looks good after seven years and being washed a couple times a year though.