Best climbing electric chainsaws?

[Khriss]

@monkeybusiness you see, this is where they go wrong.  This jiggly doesnt fit that. These batteries only fit 30% of our range. Yes we are bringing out a new design in 2021 ( cos the 2019 one was shite)   ****************kch buying into that with my hard earned. Never liked Stihl for just these reasons. K

 

 

[monkeybusiness]

3 minutes ago, Khriss said:

@monkeybusiness you see, this is where they go wrong.  This jiggly doesnt fit that. These batteries only fit 30% of our range. Yes we are bringing out a new design in 2021 ( cos the 2019 one was shite)   ****************kch buying into that with my hard earned. Never liked Stihl for just these reasons. K

 

 

Exactly that. At the last APF I asked the husky guys about their battery technology and they reckoned they had much greater capacity batteries ready to go but were holding them back to counter whatever the opposition brought to market. They reckoned there would be a long time before the current batteries would be superceded.

Last weekend I chucked out a couple of old NiCad drills. They weren’t very old in real terms, but are now irrelevant dinosaurs. 
I don’t trust either Stihl or Husky to not make any investment in their battery tech quickly redundant with new systems. Much safer to spend the money with companies with massive battery-powered ranges imo. 

[Mark_Skyland]

42 minutes ago, monkeybusiness said:

We turned up on the site that forced our hand into battery investment with our 36v Makita (which feels like a toy compared to petrol saws) and another contractor had the top-of-the-range Stihl equivalent (which was what I was going to buy, and which I expected to be miles better than our toy Makita tbh). I used both and they were much-of-a-muchness - the Stihl was definitely no better.
They aren’t petrol saws, they are all just motors running chains. Makita have been building that sort of kit along with the associated battery technology for a lot longer than Stihl or Husky so they are bound to be good at it.

One of the main reasons I was initially considering Stihl over husky (before Makita was even on my radar) was that the Stihl battery hedge cutter is apparently very good, and I thought that once I’d taken the plunge with a couple of big batteries and a charger for the saw the electric hedgecutter investment wouldn’t be massive. Obviously I wanted the biggest hedgecutter available. It transpired that the Stihl chainsaw battery system doesn’t fit their battery hedgecutter without an additional £150 lead - at that point I did a few reely difffucalt suumms and realised that Makita offered massively better value for money. I’ve since invested in the big lithium ion Makita hedgecutter (for about 60 pence) and it is the dog’s danglies! 

Stihl and Husky are one-trick-ponies when it comes to battery kit imo.

That but Stihl and Husky have been making chainsaws for a lot longer than Makita.

Stihl have a few different battery types, you need to invest in one and stick to it, the AP system is the pro series and the batteries are interchangeable between products. Husky mainly have one battery type that can be used in all machines bar the odd one machine.

 

Value for money is one thing but if its for professional use then that goes out the window.

 

I dont think you can call them one trick ponies, they are at the cutting edge forgive the pun but they do have the best battery chainsaws available ATM. I have no doubt that Makita battery machines are more than capable of doing the job but when I was climbing I would only use what was best suited to the job in hand. Since I dont climb anymore Im always looking for feedback as to what is the current best bit of kit available as lifes too short to compromise while at work so I appreciate your feedback, thanks.

 

 

 

Edited June 27, 2020 by Mark_Skyland

[Mark_Skyland]

27 minutes ago, Khriss said:

@monkeybusiness you see, this is where they go wrong.  This jiggly doesnt fit that. These batteries only fit 30% of our range. Yes we are bringing out a new design in 2021 ( cos the 2019 one was shite)   ****************kch buying into that with my hard earned. Never liked Stihl for just these reasons. K

 

 

I think its down to constantly improving the product rather than trying to make a quick buck out of supposedly duping a customer into buying a different product.

We would all like everything to backwards compatible (would be far better for me as I wouldnt have to stock so many spare parts) i.e. a part from a twenty year old machine fit a current one but then thats not progress.

 

 

[monkeybusiness]

5 minutes ago, Mark_Skyland said:

I think its down to constantly improving the product rather than trying to make a quick buck out of supposedly duping a customer into buying a different product.

We would all like everything to backwards compatible (would be far better for me as I wouldnt have to stock so many spare parts) i.e. a part from a twenty year old machine fit a current one but then thats not progress.

 

 

It must be a nightmare for dealers and I definitely sympathise with your predicament.
I am not yet convinced that Stihl or Husky offer anything significantly better than what’s available from more mainstream manufacturers when it comes to battery tech though sadly (if they did then we would buy it). 

If I were you I’d add a Makita franchise to your offering though... 

[Mark_Skyland]

TBH its not worth it. There is no profit in selling machines be it husky stihl or makita. I would rather sell a pair of socks or a carabiner tbh!

 

What I look at is if I was still climbing which machine would I use and why. Battery machines, you need to look at what types of machine  you need and what is available from each manufacture.  I always went for all out power but I think it might be worth doing a poll on what people want out of a battery machine. It is the future and it is were we are headed.

 

[Dbikeguy]

Tried the twin battery rear handle makita the other week, thought it cut ok, but it gobbled through batteries ringing up 12” timber..

[gand]

1 hour ago, Mark_Skyland said:

I think its down to constantly improving the product rather than trying to make a quick buck out of supposedly duping a customer into buying a different product.

We would all like everything to backwards compatible (would be far better for me as I wouldnt have to stock so many spare parts) i.e. a part from a twenty year old machine fit a current one but then thats not progress.

 

 

I agree completely. We stock loads of parts. We get saws like 028, 038, 009 etc. Just having to try and find space for all the new stuff thats been coming in isn't easy. Now Stihl have decided to change the bar and chain on the 261 so more stuff to stock. Those reels of chain can soon take up space 

Edited June 28, 2020 by gand

[Khriss]

@gand.   Its rubbish  ? " we are constantly improving our products" *doublespeak for couldnt be bothered to design it right in first place *   You just hit nail on head stihl 261.... WHY... No earthly reason to do what Stihl did there. In the 80's chainsaws had pretty much reached the  ' durable / power / ease of use / safety equation' peak  ( Husqvarna 61 266)   plus Harvesters came along....... Now its constant cheerleadering on their latest plastic fantastic. K

[ESS]

51 minutes ago, Khriss said:

@gand.   Its rubbish  ? " we are constantly improving our products" *doublespeak for couldnt be bothered to design it right in first place *   You just hit nail on head stihl 261.... WHY... No earthly reason to do what Stihl did there. In the 80's chainsaws had pretty much reached the  ' durable / power / ease of use / safety equation' peak  ( Husqvarna 61 266)   plus Harvesters came along....... Now its constant cheerleadering on their latest plastic fantastic. K

Not really. In the 80s the saws were just starting to improve on what they were in the 70s, i used them from both decades and some from the 60s also.

Stihl started to design more user friendly saws, moving away from the square bodied 051, 075 etc, but this was just the beginning, chain brakes ,AV , higher revving engines etc.

The 266 was a reliable saw, and a major step forward from the old 65 , the 61? well.

Compare those saws to the power to weight ratio of todays offering , the difference is outstanding.

I do not consider todays GOOD saws expensive, nor unreliable. 

I have worked with a lot of lads down the years , seen and used a lot of saws, and from my own experience it was very rarely the saws at fault.