Stihl MS170 / 180 starting , performance

[C George]

First I want to say im not Stihl expert and have only worked at a Stihl sales and service location for less than a year ,, but Ive turned wrenchs for all my life and spent 30 years in the auto parts business.

So what im dumbfounded about is that Stihl MS170 /180 saws have no air filter housing gaskets. To back up a little , we have quite a few saws come back with hard starting issues and a good friend who has done this a long time pointed this out to me. Besides dust getting sucked in , the impulse port is run by reading a properly sealed air filter housing.
So what we did to fix this was to install a gasket on each side of the af housing metal plate , I personnally like to coat paper gaskets with 2 cycle oil. We also greased the impulse port o ring where it sits into the af housing. Both those things helped starting of the saw tremendously.
So not leaving things along , I also removed the intake restrictor sleeve in the af housing ,,, wow. So as it runs today , Im running 32:1 mix ,, all this mods along with no spark arrestor screen and the exhaust louvers opened up slightly. It starts and runs grt FOR A 30cc SAW !
So whats your thoughts on this ? and sorry if a similar thread has been run many times.
Thanks from a New Member

 

[Oakie]

To be honest, these small saws really cut for their size, I nearly bought one and
would have except the carb has no adjustments, this to me is unacceptable.
Yes, you can buy a new carb that has adjustable H and L screws, but that is
a significant amount of money on top of what you already spent for the saw,
they may be cheap in places, but 349.00 euro is not cheap, so I bought an
Echo CS-352 for 276.00 euro, it has adjustable H and L screws, a better filter,
and I gutted the cat out straight after starting the saw to ensure it was working
before the operation.
Now the saw retains less heat, runs cooler and does the small trimming I need,
and all for 70.00 euro less than the MS180, and that's not counting the carb
you will eventually need for the MS180 which will cost 50.00 euro for an OEM.

I do the like the Stihl though, but when you count up the price of the mods
to make it work and last, then its too expensive.