GardenKit

Sometimes the long shaft between engine and head becomes loose and moves away from either the engine or the head, allowing the splines to come apart. Just slacken the clamps and push it fully home. You have already done the head end, so check the engine end. Or, it could be a worn clutch as you have suspected. Or it could be worn splines in the clutch drum and on the shaft. Try these simple things first.

You can swap back and forth if you need to, and dont need to run the tank dry. If, like Steve999's saw, no adjustment is needed, then this will fine. If the machine is one of the few that need a slight retune then it will be a PITA to change to and fro. Any problems caused by swapping to and fro will be down to the time spent on pump petrol, so probably best to stick to Aspen for that reason alone.

Motomix is very similar to Aspen. Aspen has been adopted by Husqvarna as their preferred alkylate fuel, but is not available in huskie packaging in the UK. Motomix is Stihls equivalent, but is also not available on the UK market. When demand for Aspen increases and they see a large enough UK market I expect both Stihl and Huskie will be offering their product. Sales of Aspen have increased quite dramatically in the UK in the past year.

In theory, 4 weeks old petrol has turned stale. In practice, many people use petrol of this age with no detriment at all. If you can use your 2.5l in the next few weeks then do so, it wont hurt anything. I can see no point in mixing it with Aspen, it will happily mix but Aspen will not turn stale petrol fresh. Alternatively, mix it with some fresh, neat, unleaded, and put in your 4 stroke lawnmower. It may smoke a little but will do no harm. Do not put it in a petrol car, it may harm the cat. Do not poor it drown the drain, it may harm the neighbours cat.

About an hour ago a lady comes into the shop after having driven about 10 miles specially. She wanted her mower serviced, and asked me to lift it out of her car. She opened the boot to find it empty. "oh dear I forgot to lift it in!" She said "its been a long week"

I am not aware that unmixed 2 stroke oil (or any other oil) degrades over time, so I think you will be safe to use it. Others may disagree.

In my opinion carbs are best stored 'wet', but only if the the fuel is fresh. This is difficult to achieve in machines which are only used occasionally. Fresh petrol does effect the rubber etc, but nowhere near as fast as stale petrol. A fuel additive such as the oregon one mentioned by Mark Skyland earlier, or the Briggs 'fuel fit' are anti-oxidants and will extend the life of petrol for a while, and offer a relatively cheap solution. Aspen is of course the ultimate solution to stale petrol, with the other benefits mentioned. Older kit may suffer more from the effects of the ethanol in modern petrol, as the materials used in newer saws have been changed to minimise the effects. For instance , carb kits now often contain a pump membrane made of woven glassbibre which was developed to resist ethanol attack. The ethanol attack happens faster with new petrol than stale. Its up to each user to decide on the action that suits him best.

I am pleased that you guys are going to try Aspen, mainly to overcome your issues with stale petrol. You are also going to benefit from another aspect of Aspen, which is that its exhaust emissions are much healthier than with normal petrol. If working in confined areas, and when the exhaust is in your face, you will notice that it is much more pleasant, leaving you feeling better at the end of the day.

Thanks Geoff Aspen is a great product which is not fully understood by many and is surrounded by a few 'myths'. I now know a lot about the product and try to put the record straight and break some of the myths wherever possible. I took a big gamble when I adopted Aspen as the main fuel in my service and repair business a year ago, but it has paid off really well. I have had very few unexpected issues with changing machines over. and none that could not easily be resolved. The customer response has been incredible.

'Pump' petrol contains around 35% solvents and 5% ethanol. These permeate the synthetic rubber of fuel hoses and carb diaphragms and destroy the rubbers built in preservatives which keep it supple. The petrol starts to slowly soften the rubber and will eventually soften it to the point where it falls apart, but in the meantime this softening keeps it supple and workable, despite the destruction of the rubbers own supple agents. Remove the petrol, as in storage, and the rubber shrinks and cracks. We have all seen this with split fuel hoses after storage. This will not rehydrate when refilled with petrol and repairs will be neccessary. Most machines however, will not suffer any adverse effects. Changing to Aspen can have the same effect as drying out, as there are no solvents in Aspen. In the worst case scenario, there may be trouble with rubber, depending on the time that it has been exposed to petrol, and rubber components may need replacing, but to be fair they would have needed sorting soon anyway. Aspen does not cause the problem, it can merely find the problem caused by petrol. Older machines will be more prone to this than newer ones. New rubber that has not been exposed to petrol will last much, much longer on Aspen than they ever will on petrol, so repaired machines, or new machines will be much more reliable on Aspen. __________________

As said by others, Aspen is the answer to you fuel needs. If your machines are in good order then they should need very little, if any, carb adjustment to swap to Aspen. If the machines are already suffering from the effects of stale fuel, then this will need fixing before changing to Aspen. Aspen will not cure existing problems. I have converted many hundreds of machines over to Aspen and the majority need no adjustment at all to run sweetly. Once converted, your machines should remain trouble free, at least from fuel issues.

.....and infect the rest of with:lol::lol: seriously though, welcome to the forum simont.

Was Ok at around 11am for me, but was playing up at 12.30

To be fair to Tanaka, there are 3 models of Toppers. The cheapest at £299 plus vat is a 33cc model with a 12" bar. This saw does seem a bit plasticy There is a 28cc with a 10" bar at £316 plus vat which is a tidier saw. The TCS 3401, 34 cc 12" at £340 plus vat comes with a 2 yr pro user warranty. Its unfair to brand the range as 'rubbish' based on the experience of one model.

I think the lift capacity is 1700kg, at the end of the link arms. This will reduce as the load moves rearwards.

As long as the linkage is in good order, especially the stabilisers, and as long as the hydraulic pump is good, you should not have too much trouble. 1 tonne is not too much, when you think that these tractors handle a one tonne fert spreader with ease. A lot will of course depend on where the weight is, i.e distance back from tractor. The closer , the better. The front box is easy to make from thick steel, no framework. Just flame cut ( or plasma) your plates and weld together. Take the side plates back down the sides of the front bolster rather than just across the front. If you run into anything, it wont bend either. Of course you wont need too much storage space outside with that massive cab.

I used to sell Zetors in a previous life. The 7045 is a bombproof tractor, just the job for you TCD. If I remember correctly, the front tyres are something like 11-24 size. These will add about 125 kg of weight each to the front on a 75% max fill. The downside is that the tyre footprint is slightly reduced as the weight is acting on the bottom of the tyre, not on the axle. Traction will therefore also be reduced slightly, but I doubt you would notice the difference. The tyre will be more prone to shock damage and steering effort may be increased. Tyre wear will be greater due to the slightly more rigid tyre. The Zetor will not go fast enough to suffer any imbalance , or 'hop'. As others have said, you will need to antifreeze them, especially where you live, we can usually get away without down here (january 2011 exception) Always used to use some sort of calcium or salt, which had to be thoroughly mixed and pumped in. Evil stuff it was. More recently used 20% strength of ethylene glycol antifreeze. If you get a puncture you will lose it, and watch out for the Environment agency, especially if you are around the resevoirs. Might be best to stick to the wafer weights, and hang them on the front, and sides of a good storage box made of 12mm.

I had a break from paying jobs this morning to do the front LH wheel bearing on my Transit. A couple of hours later and covered in grease, but its done. By the way, its a front wheel drive, thats why it took so long.

Dedication:thumbup1:

Still betting on the.......Ooooops, wrong thread. Sorry Steve:lol:

Zebra carving bars are universal fit for most saws up to 60cc. Apparently they sometimes need a bit of fettling to fit some saws. They take a 1/4 chain.

Still betting on the carb:thumbup1:

Still betting on the carb:thumbup1:

The fact that it had been unused for a while could be key here, the carb may have been 'gummed' by stale petrol and the seat of the inlet valve may be damaged, along with a change in flexibility of the metering diaphragm. Assuming that your tests have shown the breather to be clear, and vacuum eliminated, the next step will be to check the effects of pressure. When the tank pressure builds a little with vaporisation of the fuel the pressure is relieved through the fuel pump after which it meets resistance from the fuel inlet valve. If the valve is damaged, or the lever spring pressure is weak, then the inlet valve may let excess fuel through to the metering valve, causing the saw to run rich and loose power. Releasing the fuel cap will release the pressure and allow the inlet valve to shut correctly. If this is the case then a good carb overhaul will sort it out. Alternatively, test out this theory by fitting a known, good carb first. Just another wild idea, but you never know. And I really dont want to eat my genuine Australian leather hat.