spudulike

You may find it better to get a bookkeeper. My wife does mine and it is just a case of recording your earnings (turnover), taking out your business expenses (Phone, tools, fuel, kit to do your job) and you are left with profit (hopefully). Best to do this on a monthly basis so you can keep an eye on what you are actually earning. You will need to reconcile your invoices with payments in to your bank account and be accurate on this. If paid in cash then pay the cash in in the sums you have received it otherwise it will be a mare. You need to run your year from a specific month, April to April makes sense. The HMRC thing - you will need to do online self certification, basically entering in what you have turned over, what you have spent out, any other earnings such as shares, renting out rooms/land etc and then it will calculate the tax you owe. Good luck

A healthy engine, even a small one will pull 140-170psi, some manage higher but the 60 you are getting means that there is a serious issue as a seized engine often pulls more. Check the bore for wear, check the rings for wear (especially the ends), make sure they are free in their grooves, make sure the exhaust port is free of carbon, check the end gap on the rings is 7-15 thou, make sure the piston is a good fit in the bore, make sure the crown isn't cracked or holed. There must be a serious issue somewhere unless this machine has some sort of strange decomp on it!

Mmmm- should have PMed me and saved a few bucks......next time, if there is one!

Is that one pull or 5-7 pulls holding the throttle open?

The 026/MS260 are susceptible to piston slap and if left, the piston wears to the point the piston skirt can shatter. I put this down to the cylinder not being extended in to the crankcase as on some saws which does reduce this. The wear on the piston and all that aluminium will have found its way in to the main bearings and will normal leave them in a real bad way. You can try flushing them out but from what you say, it sounds like they are past reclaiming. Looks like a full rebuild to me, the cylinder may be OK if the plating isn't worn through so check this thoroughly and clean the ports and bevels before reuse.

Check the linkages on the carb are set up right. I had one that a customer had taken apart and it was doing pretty much what yours is. Make sure the choke comes off when the choke lever is raised and make sure the throttle valve opens when the throttle is opened and make sure the strato valve opens low to mid revs. It is easy to get the linkage wrong - worth taking photos when doing them as it jogs the memory - the 550/560XP choke lever is a classic case of this!

Yeah, one big $h1t slinging argument and then all make up and move on. Everyone knows where they stand then......rock and roll, bring it on:thumbup:

Impulse line, split manifold, split fuel line!

Unlikely unless it is damaged. Just split it, look for the cause of the leak, fit a new gasket and then reassemble correctly. Should be a reasonable job but if you want someone else to do it, strip it and send me just the crankcase/crankshaft assembly in and will get it stripped and assembled again. Just done a 346 for another member like this! Entirely up to you!

And I was in the middle of making a crankcase splitter.....helps when you remove all the bolts:sneaky2: I miss our chats:001_tongue:

I saw it wasn't a Mahle one but guessed Dolmar made it themselves but don't know for sure. I haven't used the saw as I get grief if I start firing up ported saws but there was a fair bit done and it should go well. Will find out when the owner picks it up and runs it a bit!

Things are only simple if you know what to do, have the tools and ability to do the job. Yes, I find it a relatively simple job but I have two sets of splitters and a multitude of pullers and devices to pull and fit seals and bearings etc Just make sure you de stress the bearings with a copper mallet once the cases are back together again.

I recently had a 6100 in for porting, an interesting experience. The saw was solid, well built and had an interesting design. Damn high compression at 200psi. Dolmar have attempted to fill the crankcase void as tight as possible without resorting to stuffers. They use reed valves for the strato part of the induction rather than piston ports - possibly to avoid patents. The owner hasn't picked the saw up so don't know how much of a difference it will make but did a fair bit to it.

OK, had similar on a 550XP with a crankcase air leak escaping in to the oil tank, did the bolts up and bingo, all good. The gasket can sometimes get drawn in to the tank and then nothing will stop it bar a new gasket - usually happens on longer sections between bolts.

You would normally have this type of clause as part of an employment contract and seems pretty dodgy to try to do it ad hoc after the event has happened. The employee will have a right to his contractual earnings and unless this is in his original contract, would say the employer is on dodgy ground!

Have you just tried doing the bolts up tight?

Mmmm freezing last winter wasn't it:001_rolleyes: Think most of our summer annuals saw it through that winter cos it weren't that cold:sneaky2:

Like that heat wave a few years back being hotter in August than June and July when both of them had been sweltering........it rained pretty much every day. I don't think we will be seeing a winter like we had in the 70s and 80s with 7' snow drifts:001_rolleyes:

The flywheel side is easy, the clutch side is an unusual one as the seal needs to be fitted over a bush with a flanged end that tends to rupture the seal on fitting unless you have the conical former that eases the seal over the lip!

What saw? Typically a long reach socket or plug socket that should locate on the outer top edge of the seal and just tap it in. Some are mothers down to lips on crankshafts or crankcase design around the seal - 346XPs are about the worst.

I had that on one of MattyFs 372s once. I put it down to the knot not being recessed in to the pulley properly. Is it wearing through or getting ingested and mashed by the flywheel?

There are two if the blades are reciprocating (both moving) and I guess one if only one blade moves but only done the former!

Cleaned up all the ports as there were other issues, ported the saw and here are the finished transfers...a lot better than before:thumbup:

I am currently porting a MS361, I knew the top end was aftermarket but on pulling it apart, noticed the top piston ring had a locating pin that ran straight down the middle of the exhaust port. The arrow on the top was pointing toward the exhaust port but had NEVER seen unsupported ring ends in a port cavity before. If manufacturers have to do this, they usually put a support pillar down the middle of the port so knew something was wrong. The piston ring had a bit of bevelling on its ring ends so it was having a hard life springing in and out of the port. I decided to pop it back together with one ring and the pin facing backward toward the inlet. I checked the ring end wasn't visible in the inlet port at BTDC and it wasn't. A few sharp pulls and good compression was reached so decided to lightly hone the bore to allow the ring a chance of bedding in again and quickly. The base gasket can be dropped on this kit but I don't think it could on the standard kit. Dropping the lower ring allows greater flexibility on widening the ports and also produces less piston friction/drag so faster revs:thumbup: I also noticed one of the transfers was poorly shaped and had lost around 1/3rd of its opening just through poor casting so it should go well once completed.

The most common causes of gearbox failure are lack of grease, they should be pumped full regularly until is squeezes out and fills all cavities. Lack of grease will shag bearings and also knock out gears. Last Echo that failed had snapped one of the little con rods in the gear box. A relatively easy fix Matt so should be an easy fix. The recoil is probably also an easy one - just strip, inspect, lube and rewind. I run a long reach and conventional trimmer just domestically and have always been good, start well and no issues to date!