Best climbing electric chainsaws?

[monkeybusiness]

I don’t think saws have improved from the 361 personally. Since then it’s been all about emissions. 

[billpierce]

No offence but that is a fairly bold statement and I would be very interested to know how it does stack up to the other brands.
 
Is the Makita as powerful, ergonomic and as nice to use as the Stihl and Husky machines? How reliable are they and are spare parts easy to get hold of. If im honest battery machines are no good for us dealers as for one the profit margin is even smaller than petrol machines and they hardly ever break so spare part sales and repairs are more or less non existent!
 

Not tried the husky one but have used the stihl msa160 and msa200. I prefer the 36v makita top handle and back handle saw. The top handle has loads of grunt ( i reckon more than msa160 though not tried side by side). Had my back handle for 8 months, no issues. And generally makita a very good on warrenty and parts ( for other kit of theres i have).

[silky fox]

Try the 161 and then the 220[emoji298][emoji367] I dismantled this tree then felled the trunk using only those two battery saws on less than a full charge each...easily.

[Peter 1955]

13 hours ago, Dbikeguy said:

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

I've just got a Makita 306Z, as I've got loads of Makita kit already, and thus loads of compatible batteries. I've had the scenario of multiple types of battery before, and won't go back to that again! I'm not a climber ( as my climber son pointed out ) but I got it mainly due to a change in working practice on one job, due to this blasted virus. As a piece of kit, I reckon it's awesome, and if you decide to cut big diameter wood, pressing the boost button makes it hard to stall. 

HOWEVER: There's no such thing as a free lunch. I saw a video on Youtube of a fella who said he was running his with six big batteries, and two double chargers permanently charging four of them! I think that's a bit extreme, but I can see where he's coming from. It flattens 6Ah batteries really, really quickly ( they're brand new, don't know if they will improve after a few cycles of charge/discharge) so as much as I love it for what I need it for, I wouldn't recommend it as a Pro saw. 

[billpierce]

Fairly sure any battery saw on logging duty is going to eat batteries fast.

I dismantled a mature ash ( 42" stem) tother day and by 6pm was onto my 3rd pair of 5ah batteries, which still had 3/4 of charge at end if day. I didnt cut much over 12" with it though, and did the stem at the end with real saw

[Mark_Skyland]

21 hours ago, gand said:

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 

It can get a bit depressing! You look at all the space machines take up costing £1000's and at the end of the day its worth bugger all

Always a nightmare with chains, no one seems to know what chain they have on the machine and end up ordering the wrong ones. The new chain/bar combo on the 261 will cause a lot of headaches for sure!

 

 

[Mark_Skyland]

I wonder how far off a decent pro 50cc  rear handle saw will be as I cant see it being viable until some new battery tech comes out. I doubt anyone would want to use a battery backpack with a cord!

 

[gand]

39 minutes ago, Mark_Skyland said:

It can get a bit depressing! You look at all the space machines take up costing £1000's and at the end of the day its worth bugger all

Always a nightmare with chains, no one seems to know what chain they have on the machine and end up ordering the wrong ones. The new chain/bar combo on the 261 will cause a lot of headaches for sure!

 

 

It's not knowing what chain they! Some folk don't even know what saw they have and it's not just the domestic users! It's going to be fun with the new bar/chain combo

[AHPP]

What’s the new 261 combo?

[Stere]

Its just a new lighter bar and some chains that cut faster as a narrow   kerf.

 

Husky and oregon already have same for a few yrs.