£200 saw upgrade

[plippy]

i have a store near me called SCATS in canterbury,i think they are nationwide, they do stihl saws, horse supplies and general farming supplies, they dont charge vat on their saws.

i picked up my ms170 for £130 and the ms180 was £150 hope that helps

[BigRedDog]

I'm no expert, but for your info I bought a Stihl MS171 for about £150 over a year ago now as it was all I could afford at the time, and I needed a small saw for shaping and tidying up. I was advised at the time (by the Stihl dealer) that as it was the cheapest model they did it really wasn't up to spec and for a little extra I'd get much more saw with a 181. But I was skint so that was that.

Considering its only the DIY cheapy cheap weekend warrior model and I have utterly abused day in day out it on building sites, doing heavy shaping work, demolition, lots of woodland work and pretty much everything you're not supposed to do its proved to be a very tough little saw. I haven't broken it yet and I expected to! I'd definitely get another, pound for pound its earned its keep.

 

I'll hold my tongue on the PPE and Tickets.

 

Good luck & have fun!

[geoff]

Ive got a 170 ms, just cant seem to make it go wrong,had it for 3 years now,the 180 can only be better.

[Pro Gard]

I would go for an MS230 preferably new, this is about the smallest of the amateur spec saws that I consider has enough guts to be useful.

 

Remember that a stihl will if looked after give you 10 years easy with light use, how many cheap saws would you have had to buy in this time.

 

Buy quality once not crap twice.

[djbobbins]

There is a dealer just up the road from here (DC Burgoyne, just east of Knowle i.e. half way between Warwick and Solihull) that is doing an MS230 with 16" bar for £306.

 

My plan is to go round there for a bit of a look and to discuss relative merits of the 230 vs a Husky 435.

[djbobbins]

Also did someone just try to send me a private message?

 

I got some kind of acceptance box on my screen which I accepted but the security software is set to reject pop-ups and so the message didn't appear...

 

I've allowed pop-ups for now if you want to get back in touch!

[djbobbins]

Called in to a local "outdoors" shop today to have a visual at the saws.

 

They've got a few different Stihls in, top of the line they stock appeared to be the MS230 16" bar.

 

But I nearly fell over when I saw the price - this is less than 10 miles away from the local specialist equipment dealer. Same saw, same bar, £410 at the outdoors shop, £306 at the equipment shop, £440 Stihl RRP.

 

More than £100 difference for two places, both authorised Stihl dealers, so close together! Clearly pays to shop around.