Stihl making a "tinking" sound

davecla

Took my Stihl 390 in for its first service the other week, have noticed a "tinking" sound when idling since then.

Any ideas what this is?

Been thru 4-5 tanks of gas since the service, seems to run ok although could use a touch more grunt.

thx - dave

windthrown

Yah, I know what that is. Pay me $5 USD and I will tell you the secret. Hint: its common in all the 290/310/390 saws.

windthrown

No takers? Man...

OK, the sound is only at idle, so hence that is the critical clue. What happens on the saw when its idling? As opposed to when it is running at higher revs?

davecla

jeez, I'm going look stupid now!

If I guess its something do to with the clutch will people point and laugh?

windthrown

Well, actually, no. You actually have the root casue of the infamous 290 dinging sound. However, the clutch itself is not making the sound. So that leaves... ???

davecla

Just went down to the shed and pulled the bar off for a look, here goes guess number two!

It's the little tin plate cover that sits over the drive sprocket virbrating when the saw is at idle?

Done it

I've never had a 390, 290 or 310 but I've had that noise in something, maybe an 034?

It's never bothered me before, now I can't get it out of my head. Thanks.

Eric Frei

So that leaves the tinny drum going ding .... ting ....... ding every now and then, and some other saws do the same. The tone may vary with brake on or off for obvious reasons.

If things are worn it will do it more, things like the needle roller bearings, or old clutch springs that allow the clutch shoes to spread easier.

The dinging may be more prevalent on those plastic stihls to remind you they're junk!

__________________

windthrown

Ain't junk. I have worked on a lot of Stihls, and the 1127 saws are actually solidly built. Way better than the Stihl 1123 saws, and a lot of other saws out there, especially some of the 'all plastic' high end Huskies that I have seen of late. The 390 has an adjustible oiler, and a decomp on it. Also the ringing parts in question here work exactly the same as on the 440s... no different. Stihl 1127 saws are the best value for the money in my book. To others, like the Troll, they are all boat anchors. They cut wood though, and they run good. I have falled a lot of large trees with a 290 myself.

As for what makes the sound, its the clutch randomly hitting the drum at idle when the clutch is not engaged. Chances are that your 390 idle was adjusted lower so that the drum rings more at idle. I think that spur sprockets also tend to ring more than rim ones do, so the 1127 saws seem to do it more than the pro saws that come from the factory with rim drives. You can put a rim drive on your 390, and I would recommend doing it. They are better on chains, they are cheaper to repalce, and you can change from 7 to 8 pin rims in a jiffy (give your short bars and chains a lot more chain speed), as well as swap from 3/8 to .325 rim drives if you have different types of bars/chains like I do.

Eric Frei

LOL,

They're the bottom of the Stihl line for wannabe's

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windthrown

I know many crews here that use 290s. Many crews...

You can buy three of them for the price of one 441.

Eric Frei

Yeah, but over here we got hard wood for hard core saws, not eons of balsa wood.

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Jeff Darby

ting aling aloo....you learn something everyday..

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windthrown

Eons? Up here that's an adjective for time. Its heaps of balsa wood... heaps.

I am burning the PNW balsa in the fireplace right now. Burns long and hard for balsa. Yah know its kind'a funny wood. It looks just like oak, weighs a ton, and has a lot of tannins in it. But yah say its balsa, do yah? That's your certified professional opinion? Oy well, what do I know. I am not ISA certified. I am just a gypo hack tree butcher. Balsa eh? And all this time I thought it was white oak. Funny that...

Eric Frei

even USA's heaviest and most dense oak wood is only 1/3 the Mpa strength of our eucs.

But you guys have a lot of pines, spruces and even redwoods are just cone bearing softies.

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Done it

There's some oaks around here mainly English Oak, a lot in the mountains.

Last year I had to clean up yet another door knocker job, they smashed a garden shed and left the log. That stuff is hard when it's dry and burns well, not much ash.

Dries a lot quicker than gums.

windthrown

Sorry, but your claims are simply not substantiated. While we do have a lot of conifers growing here, we also have a lot of hardwood forests in the American west. We also have over 100 species of eucalyptus here in the west US, many of which have naturally hybridized and technically they are new species that do not even exist in Australia. You do not have an exclusive on them, sorry. Damn invasive weeds here. We even have eucs growing on this property that I live on. But these particular ones will probably not survive the 9 degree temps that we had here yesterday, and I will get a chance to carve them up with my chainsaws and burn them here to test your theory about how hard they are. Will they break my chains cutting them up? Will they burn white-hot like coal and melt my fireplace insert? Should I use my carbide tip loop to cut them up with? Oh that's right, I forgot that I used to burn euc exclusively for several years when I was living in California.

Some wood species that grow in the American west that we have in the firewood pile here listed by Janka rating:

Mesquite: 2345
Applewood: 1730
Oregon white oak: 1660 (what I am burning now)
Pacific Madrone: 1460
Holly: 1020
Cherry: 950
Doug fir: 710-890
Bigleaf maple: 850
Red alder: 590 (use for BBQ and salmon smoking)
Balsa Wood, Janka hardness = 75-100

Oh yes, getting back to your statement about eucs being 3 times the strength of Oregon white oak? I seem to have some data that directly contradicts that. Janka rating for eucs typically used in flooring here:

Eucalyptus maculata: 2473 (is that 3 times 1660???? two times????)
Eucalyptus saligna: 2023 (let me get my calculator out here...)
Eucalyptus marginata: 1910 (oh no! the numbers are slipping!)
Eucalyptus delegatensis: 1350 (Going limp now!)

The hardest wood is lignum Vitae (Guaiacum officinale): Janka = 4500, which still short of 3 times harder than Oregon white oak. So would you like to revise your statement? Or do you claim that you regularly cut and burn the hardest eucs there like I do white oak here?

Sources:
http://www.greenmountainwoodworks.co...C%20SHEETS.pdf
Janka Scale
Janka Hardness,Imported wood species janka hardness,wood hardness,scale for wood

Eric Frei

Since when is a Janka figure an indication of strength?

Wood Strength Definitions

From that link of yours I took the oaks. Look at the first figure, that is Kn's.
Now from that link of mine note that ....

Grey Ironbark is 16.3kn
Grey Box 15kn
Grey Gum 14kn

Compare that to the above oaks and I believe you are corrected and the eucs even using the Junka scale are in some instances 3X higher.

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Bruce Hopf

Around here, the hardest woods we have, is Elm. You can take a splitting axe, and try and split it. Once you strike the block of Elm, with the splitting axe, the axe bounces right back at you.
I tried splitting it with a splitting wedge, and the 15 to 20Lbs sledge hammer, and all I got was a good work out, with several hits with the sledge hammer, to split one block of fire wood.
I then got the wedge stuck several times, and had to rescue the wedge with the chain saw. After getting the wedge freed, nicked teeth of the chain, I resorted to ripping the blocks with the chain saw, to get them apart. Blue Beach is almost as bad as the Elm, if not worse.
I don't know how they compare to your trees over there Ekka, and I don't know where you found the Kn's for the hardness of the different woods. It would be intresting, to see how these woods compare to the woods that you mentioned. Thanks again. Bruce.

__________________
McCulloch chain saws
1- Pro Mac 60, 1- Pro Mac 700, 2- Mac 10-10 Automatic's, 2- Mini Mac 30's, 2- Mac 110's,
2- Mini Mac 35's, 1- Mac 140 with Automatic Chain Sharpener,
1- Pro Mac 10-10, 1- Mac Cat, 2- Eager Beaver
2.0's, 1- Mac 1-10
Stihl chain saws
2- 044's, 2- 034's, 2- 024's, 1- 064, 1- 084,
Strunk chain saws
1- Busy Beaver, 1- SpeeDemon Special
Stand Back, I Have A Very Extreme Case of CAD (Chain Saw Addiction Disorder).

Eric Frei

From Windthrown's link.

We really need to get the Mpa shears and other attributes though

__________________

Bruce Hopf

Now you have me out in left field and the ball game was over long time ago What is, or are Mpa shears? This is all new to me, and something I never heard about till now. Thanks again, and sorry to be a pain, in the arse. Bruce.

__________________
McCulloch chain saws
1- Pro Mac 60, 1- Pro Mac 700, 2- Mac 10-10 Automatic's, 2- Mini Mac 30's, 2- Mac 110's,
2- Mini Mac 35's, 1- Mac 140 with Automatic Chain Sharpener,
1- Pro Mac 10-10, 1- Mac Cat, 2- Eager Beaver
2.0's, 1- Mac 1-10
Stihl chain saws
2- 044's, 2- 034's, 2- 024's, 1- 064, 1- 084,
Strunk chain saws
1- Busy Beaver, 1- SpeeDemon Special
Stand Back, I Have A Very Extreme Case of CAD (Chain Saw Addiction Disorder).

Eric Frei

Mpa is like psi, a force.

Timber is graded for structural use by certain attributes, the most obvious one is shear force.

This link will help, or maybe confuse most of us.

Education - Strength - Shear and Bearing

Basically if we got equal sized pieces, say 4" x 4" square and 3' long, put it in a press suspended both ends, how much force to bend it and snap it etc.

Timber is rated like this for strength.

My kanga ramps are F27 machined hardwood, I have had them over 5 years and they have been 100% of the time outdoors in all sorts of weather and driven over a lot. Prior to that I had F5 machined pine, last 3 months and bowed, twisted and split.

The pine ramps were twice as thick too.

So engineers know all these properties and can figure out what size beams they need of what material.

__________________

Bruce Hopf

Wow. I learned something new once again. Thanks for all the time, and the help and for the explanation. I really appreciate it. Being that we , maybe we should get back on coarse. Thanks again. Bruce

__________________
McCulloch chain saws
1- Pro Mac 60, 1- Pro Mac 700, 2- Mac 10-10 Automatic's, 2- Mini Mac 30's, 2- Mac 110's,
2- Mini Mac 35's, 1- Mac 140 with Automatic Chain Sharpener,
1- Pro Mac 10-10, 1- Mac Cat, 2- Eager Beaver
2.0's, 1- Mac 1-10
Stihl chain saws
2- 044's, 2- 034's, 2- 024's, 1- 064, 1- 084,
Strunk chain saws
1- Busy Beaver, 1- SpeeDemon Special
Stand Back, I Have A Very Extreme Case of CAD (Chain Saw Addiction Disorder).

stirmantrees

maybe we move the thread but it is very interesting.

Live oak is incredibely heavy around here. very strong and very heavy with a good amount of flex on those incredibly looooooong branches that grow out, then down, then back up, while self lions tailing. i would be shocked to think that there was species 3 times as strong as that across the board.

i suppose we would have to all except the systems used to determine the strength. making sure sound scientific procedures were being used. Do they use trunk wood? branches? crotches? young? old? healthy?
i guess flexibilty makes some trees stronger in certain situations rather than stiffer onesas well, perhaps a branch that was stiffer would break easier than one that had a little bend wouldnt it.. maybe? high winds, etc..
and citrus, my goodness. if we cut down an old citrus tree with say 12-14 inch diameter, holy cow... talk about one rock hard piece of wood.. i would love to have a citrus bat for home protection.. its solid.

http://www2.fpl.fs.fed.us/TechSheets...uercusmet.html

found this. look at live oak and shear is like 18 or something mpa dry? doesnt seem to soft to me
im learning here so go easy..but live oak is prob. one of the winners for oaks anyway. this shows shearing i think. ekka please decpher?
ive always thought live oak was a contender world wide. we will see.

Bruce Hopf

Another wood around here is Hickory. That too is a pretty darn hard wood. Bruce.

__________________
McCulloch chain saws
1- Pro Mac 60, 1- Pro Mac 700, 2- Mac 10-10 Automatic's, 2- Mini Mac 30's, 2- Mac 110's,
2- Mini Mac 35's, 1- Mac 140 with Automatic Chain Sharpener,
1- Pro Mac 10-10, 1- Mac Cat, 2- Eager Beaver
2.0's, 1- Mac 1-10
Stihl chain saws
2- 044's, 2- 034's, 2- 024's, 1- 064, 1- 084,
Strunk chain saws
1- Busy Beaver, 1- SpeeDemon Special
Stand Back, I Have A Very Extreme Case of CAD (Chain Saw Addiction Disorder).

stirmantrees

hickory is a beautiful tree if you ask me. they have a grand look to them and have wonderfull structure most of the time.
heavy for sure

Eric Frei

Somew unusual named woods in Brazil bloody tough too.

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Cole

ive said it once windy and ill say it again, we only use pro saws here, no compromises thats why we dont mess around with play saws, we cut hardwoods 80%+ of the time that little shit heaps only last about a month on mellidora , why would you wanna buy three of them instead of a 441 might as well go buy 30 ozito chainsaws from bunnings/home depot, sure they are good for a home owner small land owner, if you turned up on site here with a 290 you would get laughed at. we would be cheering if elm was the hardest timber we had to deal with

windthrown

Well, I look at the guy running the saw far more than the saw he has. If I can hire a guy with a 290 that knows his stuff, I would much rather have him than some green moron with a tricked out pro saw. I see this kind of stuff all the time here. Falling, off roading, skiing, whatever. At the Northwest Challange off-roading events here, the guys that win are typically in a beat up old custom Jeep, leaving the new spiffy Hummers and Landies far behind. Up in the snow, the people that I find and peel off of trees usually have the new high end pro gear. The people on older cheaper skis are usually the ones that get off the mountain all by themselves. So laugh all you want at the gear, but I will take a seasoned guy with a 290 over a some guy with less experience with a pro saw any day of the week. If you are hung up on status, being macho and looking good, then I simply do not want you on my crew, sorry.

Of course I learned to run a chainsaw with a thumb oiler using big old MACs and Homelites that weigh a ton. They were heavy saws with teeth chattering vibration. They were hard to start and smoked with high oil ratios. Running a 290 is a dream compared to running those saws. So its just a matter of perspective and experience I guess. To me, all these new saws are a dream, including the 290, 310 and 390. But then, I have actually run those saws. I suspect that in many cases, people putting down the 290 have never even run one. People seem to like to flaunt their ignorance. Same with modded saws. People put down smaller woods ported saws until they pick up and run a good one. Then they change their tune and pretty fast. I sold an 026 that I ported to a guy here yesterday. All it took was one cut with a 20 inch bar though a 14 inch oak round. The chain was not even that sharp. He did not even try to chisel me down, he just said he wanted the saw and handed me the money before I could show him how to pop off the air filter cover.

windthrown

So, you are challanging that hardness is not a measure of strength? Amusing. Your original shit stirring quote in this thread was this, Eric:

Yeah, but over here we got hard wood for hard core saws, not eons of balsa wood.

"hard wood" would mean wood hardenss, yes, no? I mean, if you are going to stir up the shit, you better make sure what kind of shit it is before it hits the wall.