spudulike

The same 372XP.... It arrived with the top end missing and had been stored in less than favourable conditions so the main bearings were gritty and notchy when turned. On consultation with the customer, we decided to fit new mains so went about splitting the cases, removing the crank and fitting new mains and seals. First pic is the home made splitter being used to separate one side of the crank. It is attached to the bar mount and a bolt used to push against the crankshaft - very heavy, basic and effective. The next shot shows the crankshaft being pushed out with the purpose made Husqvarna tool - again, simple and effective. You can also use a G clamp and a custom made shoe as I did before I had this splitter! Once split and disassembled, the bearings are driven out with a big G Clamp and inserted in a similar way. The bearings felt really bad when in place but freed a little once out which is typical.

Had a "body" of a 372XP in, this is typical of much of the work I get in. A Arb guy has picked up a couple of dead 372XPs, both badly seized and in a sad state of repair. I get both top ends and the best bottom end and a few bits and pieces. I choose the best top end and put it through the cleaning process and am happy with the results. The first pic shows two thick smears of piston aluminium bonded to the Nikasil plating on the cylinder. It looks as bad as it can get but am confident I can clean it. The second image shows the cleaned and completed cylinder - looks very good IMO:thumbup:

Yes but they will eventually release it for three months, recall it for 6 months whilst producing MS880s and then launch it again.......and that is progress:001_rolleyes:

A muffler mod will give a reasonable amount of improvement but the thing with the design of the 346XP is that it is a perfect recipient for porting as the skirts of the piston are massive in width meanig that you can widen them to the maximum that two stroke tuners like myself will go to - that is the maximum width ensuring long term reliabillity! Hell - Stubbys saw must have been ported 2-3 years ago so the reliabillity aspect speaks for itself! The muffler mod is an easy option, just depends on what you want, as it says at the base of my signature...........Speed is a question of money....................... Courtesy of Mad Max 1:thumbup:

Thanks Eddie.......... never found anybody not like a ported saw though. Some say they are a bit loud but they are as addictive as illegal drugs - even my blower and strimmer are ported:lol:

Glad to hear it Martin. Always glad to support and maintain your collection of ported kit:thumbup:

Thanks guys, always a pleasure, 3/4 through another 372XP, should be loud and proud:thumbup:

You will need to judge if it is too much or too little fuel and go from there. If it is firing, you must have a spark, I guess compression is 150+ ??? and the rest is down to the fuel system. It may have simply flooded but pulling the plug, turning the ignition off and pulling the machine over upside down should tell if this is the case - fuel runs out = flood!

Have your phone ready to snap a pic each time something comes off as it is sometimes easy to get the order of the gaskets and diaphragms the wrong way round. This is far less likely if you have done many before but I have encountered it on a few machines in the past. I would avoid changing welch plugs (those small aluminium disk caps), they need sealing and compression to make them fit and even I only change them if a leak or a runnig issue demands it. Make sure the spring under the metering arm is sited correctly and note what Gardenkit says about the metering arm height - take a look at the height of the original BEFORE it comes off and match it. Lots of good advice - don't let it scare you and just take it step by step!

Mmmmmm, the ones I have done haven't, have you checked the inlet manifold and impulse connector yet?

Muffler mods and porting don't sort out inherent issues in saws, always best to sort out the issues first. If the plug is wet and black then it is too rich and may need an adjustment. the stalling on idle could be too rich/lean ot the idle may just need adjustment. The H screw can be adjusted so the saw fourstrokes (thumps) a little on the top end but make sure the plug is a mid tan colour when done!

Most saws do but all too often down to lack of maintenance:001_rolleyes:

Yup, ADW is another Arbtalk Gent:thumbup: That piston of yours looks like it has had a bit of detonation to its crown, it is usually caused by the ignition being too advanced but these older saws have fixed ignition advance at around 19deg so unlikely to be that - perhaps just old age!

Rowena are the best, superb service:thumbup:

You will need a splined carb adjustment tool, try one turn out on both screws.

After effects of the curry and beer:lol:

It is relatively common and isn't an issue that I have ever found, when the throttle is cranked open, some fuel/oil mix escapes from the back of the carb, the fuel evaporates leaving the oil residue.

It takes great skill to still operate correctly under this duress:thumbup:

OK, my logical thoughts here, others may differ but that is life:001_rolleyes: If you use the typical single throat/choke carb for a strato engine, you are using valuable carb bore to just feed air in to the strato ports and therefore restricting the saw. If you are using one of these carbs with an additional bore with a flap valve that opens in conjunction with the throttle, you now have a conventional carb doing it's thing and a separate mechanism controlling the air for the strato part and is therefore a better design IMO. I guess the ultimate view would come from the factory engineers but the above are my views as I see them. I know the effect of resricting the air flow through the carb, even by a little amount and as much as an engineer may design the engine to work in this manner, just see it as a work around rather than a proper solution! There is an excellent vid on youtube showing a typical Strato engine in operation -https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IY7zQKw4qsQ Note the way air is fed in to the transfers and is then used to scavenge the exhaust gasses from combustion out of the engine. The 40:1 is a good idea as previously mentioned, a synthetic oil is also a very good idea.....again in my opinion.

Like I have said before, the action you need on the nearly fitted clip is compression of the two locking tabs together and the one with the tongue needs to go slightly inwards and the one with the loop slightly outwards. OK, so how do you achieve this - Plumbers grips:thumbup: don't just use them and squeeze........... angle them so when you do squeeze, they give the action you need as mentioned above. From memory, if the tab with the tongue on it is at the bottom, you need to have the grips jaws so the lower jaw pushes the tab inwards as well as upwards. It is easy to do but difficult to describe, once you have it, it is an easy operation and agree with ADW on this one. I doooo hope you are fittinng the thing BEFORE fitting the cylinder:blushing: If you are doing it in situe then God help you:001_rolleyes: I always remove the plastics from the rubber boot, check for splitting around the impulse nipple, allign the boot 100% so the nipple is located in to the cylinder perfectly and then put the clamp assembly on and then the clamp. This life is all about thinking about what you need and then adapting what you have or making tools to make it easier. I would say most guys may struggle with the first time they hit this operation but once "the knack" is achieved, it is damn easy:thumbup:

Just for clarification, when you say "Open Ports" do you mean the outer part of the transfer is not solid but is covered with a plate as on the 560 for instance? I usually call a cylinder with "Open Ports" as a cylinder with transfers that run as a channel up the inside of the cylinder and are.....well.....Open - like on the 345/350 as an example. Not trying to be funny or clever:001_tongue:

Not sure I share the Strato awe! Sure, it is a way forward for a greener two stroke but it severely limits the size of the inlet port and in some designs, the amount of fuel/oil that can flow through the carb. It is a nice idea loading a slug of clean air at the top of the fuel/air vapour stack in the transfers but the restrictions are not so good. The less fuel the saw uses, the less oil is distributed over the bottom and top end of the machine stressing bearings and top end components. Personally I would use more oil in these type of machines, some say this will lean the mix down and whilst technically, it will, it is leaning it with OIL and NOT air and that means the saw will not get hot as a lean mix caused by AIR. The autotune machines then take this to the next level and I also prefer a traditional carb despite the smart things the autotune does to mix and ignition timing! Just my thoughts, give me a conventional 2T engine over a Strato any day! Call me a dinosaur:lol:

Fitting them is easy, you just need finesse:sneaky2:

Think I would have made up something more exotic than that, how embarrassing

Reuse them and if they are a little loose, bend them a little and they will be fine. They are only covers!