Muffler mod - 036

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Logger's just wear out a 70 cc saw very quick. 90cc where they need to be.

Not around here either. The 440 and the 372 are the saws of choice in the PNW, hands down. They do typically wear them out in a year and buy new ones, but I do not know anyone that run 80-90cc saw around these parts out in the woods. I rarely see any 660s or 395s out there. A few more 460s again now that the 440s are gone again, but the 460s are gone now too. Few ever liked the 441s much around here. 372s are getting to be more common. Typical setup here is a 70cc saw with a 28 or 32 inch bar, wearing full skip full chisel loops. They are used for falling as well as limbing. The main money trees here are Doug firs, but many stands have other money trees like hemlocks and red cedar in them, as well as alders. The size varies considerably on the age of the stand, mostly from 2-4 feet DBH. The trash trees here are hardwoods; white oak, bigleaf maple, and madrone. They are dispatched easily enough with a 70cc saw.
 
...A few more 460s again now that the 440s are gone again, but the 460s are gone now too. Few ever liked the 441s much around here. 372s are getting to be more common...


Way to go Stihl! ;lol Brilliant marketing.
 
Stihl marketing has nothing to do with the removal of the 440 from the US market (twice now), or the 460, the 361, or the two models (71cc and 74cc) of the 372xp/w. The US EPA laws forced the issue, as well as the EU AV laws (440 and 460, the others already passed on AV). As for the 441, I do not know what they were thinking, but it was always a dud here in the PNW in number of sales. For that reason the 461 is rubber mounted and not on springs. I do not know why they could not get the springs better on the 441 or revise them on the 461, like they are on the MS361 or the 372xp. I have not seen many 461s out there, and the local dealer does not carry them due to the high price.

Comparing the dealer prices, the 372 and 576 are cheaper than the 441 or 461, and on Ebay you can get them for a lot less. Here the 441 goes for just under a grand (all M-tronic now), and the 461 lists for over a grand. These used to be $600-700 saws, now they are a thousand. All thanks to the EPA... though Husky has the new 365 x-torque which has virtually the same 71cc engine as the 372xp x-torque which can easily be modified to be the same as the 372xp, and it is over $100 less. So I think that Husky at least has figured out the better price point market for the 60-70cc EPA saws, whereas Stihl has not. The 440 was a great saw, as was the 361. As for the 036... should be a good saw, but if you are used to more power, maybe not. It should be easy enough to open up the muffler on those. I use my stock 361s far more than any of my other saws. I would like to find an 034 Super (60cc predecessor of the 036/360), but that has been a hard one to hunt down.
 
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I was cruising ebay last evening looking for a P/C kit for that 046 and someone had a P/C set that they claim would make that saw equivalent to the 066 magnum.....anyone ever hear of this? Now, bear in mind fellas.....I've built LOTS AND LOTS of the old magnesium bodied saws, but not a whole lot of these more 'modern' saws......

http://www.ebay.com/itm/BIG-BORE-54...722?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3f2083af92

If that kit is for real, I may have to look into it..Yes it's a Chinese kit, not a Stihl kit, but I don't want to be 700 bucks into that saw either.......I did pick up a Chinese knock-off case for my 372XP the other day on fleabay, we'll have a thread when it arrives and when I get a chance to put that back together (it'll be a while, lots of tree work lined up right now)......

I'll be putting a signature "Overkill" port job on the XP also, maybe even do a little port work while it's apart (match port, I don't have the tools for Woods porting yet).
 
I was cruising ebay last evening looking for a P/C kit for that 046 and someone had a P/C set that they claim would make that saw equivalent to the 066 magnum.....anyone ever hear of this? Now, bear in mind fellas.....I've built LOTS AND LOTS of the old magnesium bodied saws, but not a whole lot of these more 'modern' saws......

http://www.ebay.com/itm/BIG-BORE-54...722?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3f2083af92

If that kit is for real, I may have to look into it..Yes it's a Chinese kit, not a Stihl kit, but I don't want to be 700 bucks into that saw either.......I did pick up a Chinese knock-off case for my 372XP the other day on fleabay, we'll have a thread when it arrives and when I get a chance to put that back together (it'll be a while, lots of tree work lined up right now)......

I'll be putting a signature "Overkill" port job on the XP also, maybe even do a little port work while it's apart (match port, I don't have the tools for Woods porting yet).
That price seems a little too good... to be a quality long term option. Though I haven't seen much negative about that company on the interwebs.
 
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Scotty,

I have some thoughts on the subject. As you may remember I built two MS460s recently from the ground up and one of them is a 54mm Chinese top end kit like the one you linked to. It ain't gonna magically turn into an 066 for ya but the kits aren't junk either. The build threads are linked in my sig.

The nikasil kits are very good indeed. Longevity should be close to OEM but there are usually some differences in port size. Enough so that I could spot most of them by eye. They run good out of the box but I bet if you widened the ports wether by grinder or file, as far as the piston will allow, the saw would run pretty darn decent.

They make kits that include a dual port muffler as well but I'm sure you have your own plan for that. ;)

There was a guy selling OEM back handle assemblies for $100. Hard to beat that for sure. Both me and Boog got one for our saws.
 
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Would be kind of hard to do since the 066 has 4mm of stroke over the 046. ;) The bore is indeed 54mm on the 066 however. (046 = 52mm x 36mm, 066M = 54mm x 40mm)

http://www.getsaws.com/S_specs.html
i knew the stroke was a little deeper on the 066/660, but the big bore kit gives you the same bore. Should make for a good runner when i get it done. Il probably buy that kit, now im on the hunt for a back handle..........
 
To get back to Joful's original topic -- muffler mod and power gain.

There is a guy over on AS that built a chainsaw dyno. He showed a 20% HP gain with a dual port vs a single port on a 046. 3.426 HP to the bar vs 4.13 with the dual port.

Edit/ those numbers were for a rebuilt ms460
 
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To get back to Joful's original topic -- muffler mod and power gain.

There is a guy over on AS that built a chainsaw dyno. He showed a 20% HP gain with a dual port vs a single port on a 046. 3.426 HP to the bar vs 4.13 with the dual port.

Both those numbers seem very low for an 046. Any how if you can get 20 percent with an extra hole by all means drill.
 
The number do seem low. Maybe the testing methods are different. But the gain with the dual port is bigger than I would have expected.

Here is the dyno build thread

IMG_20130709_225729_691_zpsfac22a6e.jpg
 
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The number do seem low. Maybe the testing methods are different. But the gain with the dual port is bigger than I would have expected.

Here is the dyno build thread

IMG_20130709_225729_691_zpsfac22a6e.jpg
Wonder why the rim drive at the test end of the dyno is so big? I'm guessing that is why the HP numbers are low.....
Maybe if he had a rim that was more in line with the actual diameter of the bar sprocket, he'd get different numbers......just a guess, though. I didn't go all the way through the thread. Either way, very cool homebuilt dyno, there!
 
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There are a couple different build threads over there. One of the explained the reasoning for the setup. I don't remember the details but I know he is measuring the pounds of pressure applied to the end of a 1 foot bar. It's all a little over my head lol. But I think it does give a good baseline for measuring gains from various mods.

Dynosketch_zps0a9ab13d.png
 
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There are a couple different build threads over there. One of the explained the reasoning for the setup. I don't remember the details but I know he is measuring the pounds of pressure applied to the end of a 1 foot bar. It's all a little over my head lol. But I think it does give a good baseline for measuring gains from various mods.

Dynosketch_zps0a9ab13d.png
There are a couple different build threads over there. One of the explained the reasoning for the setup. I don't remember the details but I know he is measuring the pounds of pressure applied to the end of a 1 foot bar. It's all a little over my head lol. But I think it does give a good baseline for measuring gains from various mods.

Dynosketch_zps0a9ab13d.png




Seems and I don't know but you would want to run the test maybe 20 times and get an average. But, he pick the best saw to see some big gains on...(And that's heading Modds in the right direction) I like it....
 
Wonder why the rim drive at the test end of the dyno is so big?
He said that he used a 24t sprocket to keep the hydraulic pump below 4000 rpm to prevent cavitation. Wonder if that is why his numbers are different than those published by Stihl?


Or maybe manufacturers use theoretical, or gasp, inflated numbers like the lawn mower makers did.
 
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I would think that when saw companies are stating horsepower they are using a measurement of shaft horsepower vs horsepower to the chain and the resulting mechanical loss of horsepower that results. That being said; the difference in advertised horsepower and the results from the test stand seem to be too divergent for mechanical loss alone.
 
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He's definitely losing power to heat and inefficiency of the hydraulic pump but for before and after comparisons plus model to model comparisons, the data is good! Only absolute HP numbers would require the dyno to be "calibrated". Sprocket size doesn't affect anything HP-wise, does your truck make less HP in 1st gear than it does in 2nd? Didn't think so.

Somebody here did a pretty good photoshoot of the Dual-port mufflers vs the standard US muffler for the MS460. Can't remember who it was, don't think they posted here often..... ;)

Found it!
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/dual-port-mufflers-a-comparison.105336/
 
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