pleasant

Symptoms seem to suggest an air leak......the carb seems all over the place

Personally I would start with the easiest and most likely cause which you have already alluded to, and fit a new hose, then check everything else after.

That last video shows it seemingly running very rich

Crack in the mangesium casing, failed o-ring on the filler cap, gasket failure between casing halves, tank vent valve failure, oil hose perished or chafed

Chain oil or fuel leak- can't tell as it's soaked into the cardboard. I would guess chain oil leak given the pic locations, but you never know.

I think you are thinking of all the tv adverts now

Do you have a can of carb spray with one of those long plastic nozzle adaptors? If so, set it up like you have and start it up. Gently spray the carb cleaner using the nozzle in or around the recoil area- ensure you don't get to close to the carb/filter area as you don't want a false reading. If you have a crank leak on the recoil, side then by spraying the carb spray in that specific area the revs will increase, or it will possibly stall due to it being too rich with the spray, but normally it will rev up momentarily. If you are unsure if you have a leak around the intake boot etc, then use the same trick- but like I say but a barrier between the intake boot and the carb intake. It's quick and easy. If you want to do it really properly, then remove the starter with the engine running to expose the flywheel, then apply the spray- just be very careful removing the recoil on a running engine. Would suggest before starting you remove three of the four screws and just leave those in place that take most of the pressure when pulling the rope. The ones you have left in place, loosen them first then lightly screw them back in before starting. That way less pressure will need to be applied to remove them. There are several videos on youtube showing this proceedure if you want to check them first if you are unsure. Here's one for example:

To be fair, in the beginning the formation of unions did improve workhouses etc, and an awful lot of what we take for granted now came about as a result of their campaigining. However, what with the constant progress and improvements in working practices and the regular introduction and updating of legistaltion to protect not only workers, but employers as well, the modern day unions (in the UK at least) are having trouble to justify their existance (and their subs from their members) so they have to be seen to 'be doing something' And more now than ever.

The longest OE bar from stihl that will fit the 231 is the 18" off the 251. Recommended bar length for the 231 is 16" although for occasional use it will cope with the 18" just, even so, it will cut effectively on both upper and lower rails. The extra 2" wont highlight the issues the OP has.

Your statement can be taken either way in the context of the question.

You can blame bliar for that. His policy was to get everyone into university....overnight the value of all but the highest academic degrees were devalued to the point everyone of even mediocre intelligence were getting a degree in media, arts etc. That was when companies looking for the best to recruit stopped looking fior one degree, but two....or only considering candidates with the top half dozen academic degrees. We joked at the time we would be looking for a cleaner with a degree before they even got an interview. Now they realise that, and are looking at going back to apprenticeships and professional qualifications....gone full circle.

The only way out if you are on the bottom rung and you want to earn more is to improve your qualifications to go up a pay grade or leave, but at the end of the day, a manual job with no qualifications is going to pay roughly the same across the board anyway....but without a lot of the benefits of working for the nhs

Yes, but that is the same in all walks of life, not just the NHS, but they seem to think theirs is a unique issue which it isnt. Give those at the bottom a pay rise....justified or not, then quite rightly those higher skilled above will want a re set of the differential and so it goes on up the ladder. And at the end of it all the ones at the bottom are actually no better off because everything has increaed

Any one and every one ? Still want a pint at the pub when on strike, still want your paper and your fags, still want a takeaway. Still want some one to fix your broken machines.

If they get the 19% they are after then the only thing that will improve is their wages....everything else they are allegedly unhappy with regarding their jobs won't improve as the funds to do so will have gone to them

A fair point, and one the MSM won't report on. They prefer the pitchfork waving and sabre rattling approach for sensationalism to get 'clicks' and 'views'

Yup.....another I had was a guy was complaining no matter how much he tried, after adjusting the chain...correctly he said, after the first cut the chain would loosen right up. Told him to bring it in which he did, I said 'show me how you tension the chain then' He proceeded to do everything correctly.....until before tightening the cover nuts he didnt take the weight of the power head by the end of the bar, consequently as soon as he was putting any pressure on the bar in first cut, the bar would slip upwards slightly thus slackening off the chain, before having further upward movement halted by underside of the front bar stud in the mount. Showed him how to do it and he never came back with that issue again. Like i said in an earlier post.....it's a lot easier to come to a conclusion after you've seen the machine AND the operator.

Spud, I am pretty certain the bar mount for a Stihl bar that takes a 1.6mm gauge chain will be too big for the MS231 and the adjuster pin will not locate either.

Looking at the vacancies on all the recruitment sites for the NHS I don't see any jobs on there with 'poor' pay. The jobs i can find on there that are minimum wage or just above are those that are right at the entry level or non qualified menial jobs.....yes still important i know, but no different to any other employment walk of life

This is one of those 'telephone' questions, we sometimes get, whereby what is happening in theory is impossible to happen. We always find a picture paints a thousand words and so does having the customer in front of us to describe exactly the issue...for that reason we always ask the customer to come in with the complete saw and if they can, take a video to show the issue. I am not going to guess with this one, as that is all it would be, and like has been stated, all the cutting components are new, so if there are no obvious failures within the powerhead, then its nigh on impossible for a saw to be doing this, especially if It is being tested on the same wood and in the same conditions. I usually find casting a pair of experienced eyes over the saw and listening with a pair of experienced ears, usually gets to the root of the issue.

I would be someone who would advocate manufacturers put their names and logos the opposite way up on the two sides of the bars. Then people with an OCD affliction wont be as concerned and would encourage the flipping of bars for the rest of us. Would draw attention from the weekend warriors I deal with, as they would ask why the name is upside down on one side- would give me the opportunity to tell them why, and the manufacturer doing it with the name on the bar endorses the practice. Its simple, and it is for only aesthetic reasons they don't do it already.

As with anything it really depends what spares you are after. Popular, fast moving spares are generally available for many years after a model has been discontinued....particularly if certain parts are carried over to later models. Slower moving, less likely to go wrong parts are the first to go obsolete.

Dynamac were rebranded efco/oleo mac products specifically made for the budget market. Emak are the parent company and they, in turn are owned by the Yama Group investment arm. They re branded a lot of their products for other manufacturers-including certain saws for john deere for example.

Identical. Oleo mac and efco are the same company. Oleo mac used to be a brand sold in the uk, and then they re-branded for the uk and usa as efco pre 2000 as particularly in the states they thought efco was a more recognised brand. Pretty much rest of the world stayed branded as oleo mac. When covid came along and they shut the factory, when they re-started production they saw no sense in producing identical machines on two production lines, with the only difference being the name and colour of the plastic its made from, so decided to withdraw the efco brand and it was all oleo mac. But all this pre dates the 999 and 199 models as these were an obsolete model some years ago now.

excellent saw...very under rated. Not been made for several years now, so assume its a used one your are looking at