Chris Sheppard

550 would be the closer equivalent to your 261 I think but I'd be fairly confident it would kick the 261's arse in performance. I had one of the first 550's and mine's been great. It's not been out so much just lately but I dug it out the other day and had forgotten just how poky it is. Generally mine's on a 13" but i had a 15" on it for some Sycamore thinnings in the summer and it did it no bother. They were the sort of size I'd generally have een taking the 357 into. Had a 560 on demo for a week prior to ordering the 550 and was that impressed I ordered the 550 off the back of the demo. 560's not much heavier than the 550 but the extra power is really noticable. I'd go as far as saying it's probably not a million miles behind my 372 but a good chunk faster cutting than my 357. A lot depends on what you're using it for - Mine's out in the woods thinning, as a chipper/ground saw it's maybe a bit overkill.

Don't know where it would end up going locally to you, but chances are you'd get more for it splitting it into sub 40cm TD and oversize as you'd only get oversize price for it if you mixed it and that's often as much as £4/T difference at roadside (well is round us anyway). If you struggle dealing direct, try someone like Euroforest - you'd get a bit less for it and they often take 90 days or more to pay but it get's it moving fairly quickly. Round us typically it's high £30's for 3.7m sub 40cm TD logs at roadside, depending on where we are.

Yes, much better for ringing up than a 346 or 357.

Proper woodmans tractor Complete with cab big enough to live in

Dad went through one of the yellow plastic gas pipes when digging out for his driveway. It was something like 15 years or so ago so don't know if it's changed since, but they repaired it FOC as it was fairly shallow (less than a spade's depth). First bloke came out and wrapped the gunky tape round it and a few hours later another van came out and stuck a join in in about 10 min.

'Tis but a scratch Is it terminal? Least there's an excuse to buy a proper saw now

Perhaps, but ringing up a 30 odd inch stem with a 24" bar is going to take a whole lot of time longer than it would with a big saw with a long enough bar. There's getting away with something if you have to and there's having the right saw for the job

Reckon you'l be fine, just don't expect to swing it round like you can your 346. A guy I work with isn't much heavier that you I reckon and he can handle the 3120 with 42" bar fine. As much as I prefer Huskies, the Stihl MS660 really does handle like a much smaller saw in comparison the the 395 - I'd at least get a look at one before going for a 395. Th other one is the husky 390 - I've not used one but did have hold of one and it felt less numb compared to a 395. The one thing that felt a bit odd was the back handle is quite chunky but I'm sure you get used to it. Not tried the 576 but I'd be surprised if it would easily pull a 30" bar as a 395/660 both know if they are full bar in something hard with a 30" on.

I've always owned Husky (or Jonsered) but have tried a few of the stihls (024, 026/260, 440, 441, 066/660 and 880) and on the whole I prefer the Husky saws over the equivalnt sized stihl; the exception being the 066, which I do get on well with. 088 or 3120 I'm not really fussed but don't use either with much regularity. Out in the woods, I like the way the Huskies handle and I like the way the power is delivered, much more responsive and almost agressive. On arb jobs I'd be less fussy but generally the saws on site are usually mostly Huskies, whosever they are. I have been looking at the tiny echo, the stihl ms150 and also the 90cc makita/dolmar so I'm not tunnel visioned enough to think there's nothing better. Thinking about it, before the 550 was launched I would have about taken anything to not have had to go ms 261 or 346xp It's not that they might be bad saws, I just wanted something better.

Think husky might have beaten you there with the ECU

You should be using your time more constructively and trying to fit a VNT and shiny exhaust to it

Proper pro, using a jonsered Made it look effortless. Reckon we should maybe get an arbtalk logging competition sorted out at one of the shows so we can all make fools of ourselves

I'm level 100, what do I win?

Nah, that's current CS31 that is

Could be worse, could have started the back cut

Wow - that looks fantastic

Am liking both of those

I'm quite fancying one of these for at home after seeing it in another thread Powerhorse 13-Tonne Towed Horizontal Log Splitter 208cc It's more than likely chinese but it's not much more than one of the Handy ones and should be OK speed wise even if the ram's a bit slow.

Dunno, reckon Landy would have got that far - difference would be I bet Ben's feet were still dry whereas landy footwells would be full We were following a BT van today and he hit a deepish bit going far too fast and fortunately for him managed to carry some momentum to get him a fair way through once it had died. He did get it going again before too long but there was a fair bit of steam in amongst the smoke and it didn't look very healthy for a bit.

Even so, you're still simple Dave

Great pics Looks like a really nice place to spend time

Sorry, just winds me up - used to get it a fair bit round us when it was flooded, people ignoring road closed signs and often pushing water into peoples houses just to save a detour. But, it's still a closed road - would you drive through a red traffic light?

Chances are they were sick of people ignoring the Road closed signs, driving through the water and the waves then pushing the water over their door thresholds. Just because you're able to drve through it, doesn't make it right. They don't close roads for no reason And looks like you were trying to do the same again in the photo