spudulike

Hang on, there is only one Spud

Damn...thanks to Mr Stubby, I now have a kit of bits and will assemble them in to what I hope will be a playable guitar. The body is light, the neck is surprising - two way truss rod, the frets look well set and level plus looks well finished but as all necks.....will do my own setup. All the metal parts are typical cheapo but should work OK once done. If it plays OK and it is worth it, I will swap out the less good parts in time but should pass some time away during these desperate times.

I would have thought the saw would be wearing 3/8th Picco Low Pro chain so 1.3mm gauge. Some may fit the 1.6mm 3/8 full profile but it would be a bit heavy for the saw and sap power.

I have only ever changed one MS200T coils for going faulty and that was DEAD. Two of the most common faults are: - 1) The black kill wire coming from the coil is earthing out and this can happen where it bends off the spade connector and disappears under the coil - it touches the metal case just above the bottom AV mount. The wire can also get pinched under the coil location pillars and generally happens when the coil has been removed. I did have one where the owner fitted an extra long top front AV screw which rubbed through the wire outer and earthed out when the AV was compressed. I agree with Wonky on trying to disconnect the black wire from the coil......surprised he didn't mention old fuel but there you go 2) The HT lead can play up, typically where it is clamped by the oil pump or within the HT plug cap when the spur comes off the lead. One Heath Robinson check is to get an old plug and bend the end electrode out or remove it and see if the spark will jump the gap, if it does, it is less likely the coil and HT lead are faulty plus any sparking from the HT lead will be visible in subdued light. Other than that, the gap between coil and flywheel should be set with a plastic setting card or use a typical business card, if it is too large a gap, it can play up. The other is that many miss the spark when tested and believe that the spark isn't there when it is in fact, working as it should - an old plug with the end electrode bent out at 45 degrees makes a good tester. These coils tend to be pretty reliable and rarely fail. If the gap has been set far too tight and the coil has clouted the flywheel for a long period, it is possible to lose the magnets on the coil but have only seen this once on a MS461, never on this model.

You can use a smear of liquid gasket to sort that out but have seen screwdriver damage around the end of the manifolds where the uninitiated lever the manifold out of the back of the air box and slip. Easy to miss if you plug the manifold to seal it. ....the joys

Grasshopper, you have been a good student

I had one of those Velly Velly good 372XPs Hrvatsqvna or whatever they are on the bench some time ago. It looked like a 372 but you knew something wasn't quite right, bit like picking up any knock of item TBH. I found the recoil spring was very thick so it didn't feel right, all the lines were made out of some cheap rubber not decent nitrile so they didn't fit quite right. The biggest issue was stress fractures in the alloy around the main bearings which put me off the whole experience in a big way. I would be interested to see how those MS660s work being used on a 36" regularly. One of my customers was a bit tight, I got through two AM cranks, one sheared in two, the other big end grenaded so eventually fitted an OEM one then some fecker pinched it. My take is they are a project, a rarely used backup saw or weekend warriors saw, made with substandard bits that won't last like the OEM parts. Some parts work and some are utter shyte....try the AM AV rubbers on an MS200T....they are one part that is shyte...cheap....but shyte.

Here's a thing.......... When I was PAYE, like many, I looked forward to Easter and....well....all bank holidays. Since being self employed.....they really don't mean that much apart from their significance as religious festivals and they become just a normal working day. It is a funny old thing - this Easter, all those PAYE workers will get a taster of one aspect of self employment....the Easter Bank Holiday will pretty much mean nothing, no nice long weekend and a short working week before and after the bank holidays!

I usually just give the saw vac or pressure, waggle the flywheel around and if there is no immediate drop, all is good. You pretty much always get a leak straight away on a faulty machine and is obvious from the start of the test. I know many will say you should.......but I will be damned if I sit around for 10 minutes watching a little gauge do its thing....sounds like watching paint dry. Glad it is looking good though, always an important test as if you get any weird running, you know the main engine is 100% sound and the issue must be somewhere else.

OK, lovely

Why.....can't work that out, grave digging may be more appropriate! Fortunately, I don't sail close to the wind and with age comes experience and with experience comes inner strength and knowledge to deal with stuff life throws at you!

14" sounds good to me, 18" is pretty optimistic in my opinion. A very basic rule of thumb is 1/3 of the engine cc gives you the maximum bar length so your 45cc gives 15" bar length

I am self employed and fit the criteria so expect payment as per the support directive some time in June.....a first for me but work has fallen off a cliff edge and may last a fair time.

The idle screw shouldn't be that loose, use a little thread lock on it or superglue just to hold it. I have never set the idle screw like you do, you usually set the H&L screw to typically one turn out each (may be different on some saws and depends if limiters are fitted) and then adjust the idle to suit. If the carb has had a major rebuild, I usually turn the idle right out until you cant see light around the throttle valve plate and then turn it in until you can start seeing light around it so you get a reasonable start position.

Looks like a nice job to me and have slept a fair bit in my time so consider myself an expert

Yeah....new fuel....... nothing to do with sorting the carb out!

Good, glad it worked out OK

The saw has used a number of carbs over the years but the ones I have done, the metering arm is set level with the surrounding metal around it and not level with the part the diaphragm sits on like the MS200 C1Q

You could have flooded it....plug out, turn upside down and pull it over fast a few times, if fuel runs out, it is flooded. Let it dry, heat the plug, pop it back in, hold the throttle wide open and pull it over hard, no decomp and see if it pops.

The basics are spark, fuel and compression. Spark - earth it on top of the cylinder and pull over the saw hard, it should be a nice fat spark. After trying to start it, the plug should be damp - if it isn't, it will most likely be the carb. Compression - can you feel good compression on the starter handle? It is possible that you didn't set the metering arm on the new carb kit and it now isn't letting in fuel (dry plug) or holding the needle valve open and flooding the engine (wet plug). It is most likely a fuel problem if it ran fine on the last outing and went away running. All petrol engines suck air - it is the way they work!

I can't see why a dry needle bearing should cause a clutch spring to snap. It is usually either the shoes wearing through the spring loop or it just fatigues and breaks.

Yes on pressure and vac testing through the plug hole, I made an adaptor as you are suggesting.

I don't know on the squish, the breathers only let air in but do flow one way only.

On oiling, if the saw is fired up with no bar, you should get a good solid dribble of oil running down the side of the saw in a few seconds. My usual inspection is to check the bar oiler hole....you would be surprised, just done a MS150 and it was blocked!!! Spin the clutch off, check the oiler arm isn't loose on the plastic pinion and grips the pinion well. Check the END of the oiler arm, they often wear off especially when the drum is a bit wobbly. If this is all OK then the oil pump comes off, check the oil pickup filter and pipe isn't blocked - the tank should be fine if you have flushed it. Check the plastic pinion thread is good - VERY unlikely it has failed on this machine model. The pump...if you put the drive shaft in certain positions, carb cleaner/WD40 can generally be forced passed it if sprayed down the outlet hole so try that, look down the holes and you can use a compressor on it. The plug will be on the inlet side of the pump if plugged. You can use a bit of fuel line pushed against the holes and blow through them. If the pump is clear and the spray goes through a bit easy then if the machine is high hours then it may be the pump is bad - the steel pump shaft can wear the alloy it sits in and after a time, it will stop pumping with any force so a new one will be needed. If that doesn't work.....panic

There should be no "up and down" movement in the piston to crank but there is always a slight movement side to side piston to con rod and around 2mm each side of the rod to the crank lobes at the big end.....if I am understanding you correctly. This float is perfectly acceptable whereas vertical movement shows wear in the ends, gudgeon pin or crank bearings. The crank shouldn't move in the cases on this saw. They will on MS200s and similar as the bearings are a needle type allowing for some end-float and not roller bearings which hold the crank in place.