Thread: Makita Electric chainsaw problem

Crazy coincidence. I was just about to ask the forum if electric chainsaws are any good. I've found a few almost-new ones on Gumtree.

To answer the question, I'd wager the absence on information and difficulty in sharpening are down to these cynical truths:

- consumers are retarded. They would use it until it was blunt then throw it out. At $150 it will last 3 jobs or two years. Good enough. One more sale to Makita please.
- consumers are retarded. They would chop off their fingers trying to do an operation such as this. It's too complex. Exhibit 1- Ikea knock down furniture... A into B is too hard for most.
- consumers are retarded. Safety mechanism after safety mechanism after safety mechanism are added until the function of the device is so compromised it barely works. My bet is placed that sharpening is "prohibited" not for sales, but a means of eliminating being sued by Exhibit 1 level consumers.

One thing few people are aware about with electric chainsaws is that chainsaw chaps, that are highly effective on petrol powered saws, are generally useless in defending against an electric chainsaw.
Electric motors have their highest torque at lowest revs and so are much harder to stall compared to a two stroke motor.

In case you are unaware here is a very interesting map of chainsaw injuries.


I know a couple of people who have used electric chainsaws for occasional milling. Just like a small petrol powered saw they keep the chain as sharp as possible and don't push the saw too hard. One guy I know uses his Stihl electric to mill up railway sleepers and he has milled at least many old railway sleepers over the last decade. For long term milling unless we are talking brand name they are unlikely to last for long as milling is very stressful on saws. The cheaper electric saws are plastic junk and I reckon a cheap chinese petrol powered saw would last longer than a cheap electric.

There's really only one electric saw available to reproduce what a petrol saw can do.

I should add, however, that here I'm really only comparing it to the smaller end of the "professional" petrol saw range.

The Stihl E220 has a similar capacity and performance to a MS260.

I've used other electric saws, including a "monster" three phase E30 Stihl with a four foot bar breaking down sawlogs to length on a sawmill skid. I've tried a Chinese 2000w cheapie, smaller Stihls, a 2000w Husky and now have a pair of E220s and the Husky.

The Stihl uses a 16" bar as standard. I've also used it with a 36" bar with skip tooth chain in an Alaskan Mill. Too much bar, too much load on the chain, and too much overheating of the motor due to less rpm's caused by the friction of the long chain. Nevertheless, some sawmilling colleagues of mine use these little Stihls for docking logs in their sawmills.

The Stihl uses a proper 3/8" picco chain as standard in common with most small, midrange and large professional saws, meaning that both bars and chain are interchangeable with my 026 & 064 petrol saws (but not the 090). All other electric saws use that stupid narrow, weak, stretchy 3/8" low profile chain in common with "toy" petrol saws.

The Husky is a fairly good saw otherwise, however it still uses that stupid low profile chain which is a pain. It's main advantage is it's Inline motor design (think 9" angle grinder). This makes the saw very slender & long but beautifully balanced and "wieldy" in comparison to the "east-west" motor configuration. This makes it well suited to duty as a carpenters saw, where the smaller chain translates to less splintering and damage when cutting kiln dried timbers.

If used properly, it's probably a safer alternative to a circular saw when used overhead to trim rafter angle cuts to length, for example.

But as a firewood saw, only the Stihl E220 really cuts the mustard. That's why it's the hire industry standard electric saw across the globe. Simple, robust and reliable. For firewood, anything with less power is really only a toy.

I harvest dry bush poles, cutting & carting them in 6' lengths home. At home I use the Stihl to dock these poles to the required length for firewood in multiples of up to 8 at one time! Less noise, less fuss no fumes and I can drive the 50km round trip, harvest, dock and stack 1 1/2 ton in about 2 to 2 1/2 hours door to door, which I could never do if I were cutting them to length in situ. The extra docking & handling alone would be over an hour!

Originally Posted by Logman

I've just bought a new Makita electric chainsaw .........
Then the solution came from some wonderful guy that all you have to do is hold the trigger (power plug removed of course) and it lets you move tooth by tooth.
What bothers me is that that post was in 2007 and yet the latest manual 2012 does not tell me that. We all know mistakes can be made but no action in 5 years !!!!????

The reason - no legal department could defend telling consumers to "pull the chain forward whilst holding the trigger" all because some consumers are ... well they just don't bother to read instructions and safety warnings - no matter how bold the print is. I wouldn't go arround telling too many people either, because some consumers are ......

Originally Posted by BobL

Electric motors have their highest torque at lowest revs and so are much harder to stall compared to a two stroke motor.

My understanding was that AC electric motors developed their highest torque at high revs, and that it was only DC motors which developed high torque at low revs. Do electric chainsaws use DC motors? (I know the battery operated ones do, but assumed that the mains operated ones used AC motors).

Originally Posted by Colin62

My understanding was that AC electric motors developed their highest torque at high revs, and that it was only DC motors which developed high torque at low revs. Do electric chainsaws use DC motors? (I know the battery operated ones do, but assumed that the mains operated ones used AC motors).

Colin I respectfully suggest that you may be confusing AC/DC with "universal" and "induction" motors.

AC motors are usually mains powered motors of 110-450v (or even greater) using current that alternates (reverses) at 50-60Hz or cycles per second. These are our standard household and industrial mains used commonly across the globe. AC motors are further divided into single & 3 phase configurations: the former for lower powered and domestic, the latter for high powered or industrial applications.

DC motors use voltage that has an unchanging positive and negative polarity, and typically appear in battery powered devices. Most common are single phase variants, although newer "brushless" battery power tools are 2 or 3 phase.

Universal motors typically are lower powered (<2hp) motors with brushes that provide prodigious torque at low revs. Common uses are mains and battery powered power tools, toys and household appliances. They are also easily and cheaply modified to provide variable speed and reversing operation in "no", "partial" and "full wave" configurations, the latter providing maximum torque at ANY RPM.

Induction motors typically have permanent magnets in the rotor. The opposing EMF's are excited with electromagnets, and typically are used in fixed speed and/or industrial applications. They can be modified to provide variable speed performance, but the sheer complexity of the electronic controls necessary are expensive. A common use is in Wood Lathes that can provide multiple gearless FIXED speeds (not true variable). My last 2 Miele washing machines used variable speed 240v 3 phase induction motors. They are big, heavy and expensive relative to their limited power and torque outputs, and therefore unsuited to most portable applications. They are also extremely reliable, quiet and long lasting. Submarines, trams and railway engines all use Induction motors. The former rectified from DC battery banks, the train from an onboard diesel generator and the tram (usually) from DC mains. Induction motors have often extreme current draw on startup, and being typically fixed speed will only be capable of being fully loaded when up to operating RPM's.

Induction motors will only operate in reverse by reversing the current to one of the field coils. Reversing the "polarity" of an alternating current will obviously have no effect whatsoever!

Brushless AC motors are a type of hybrid design, using DC (battery) voltage rectified to AC. Their permanent magnets are on the "inside" (rotor) instead of the more usual "outside" (stator). They therefore don't require heat & friction producing (energy sapping) carbon brushes to excite an electromagnetic field in the rotor. Their disadvantages are expense, complexity and typically lower maximum torque output than universal DC motors, which is countered by significantly lower current draw (and correspondingly longer charge life) in cordless tools. With only bearing friction and load to consider, these motors SHOULD be very long lived in comparison to other DC universal brush motors. I note that Milwaukee seem to be having some reliability problems with this new technology however, with high proportions of warranty claims.

Electric chainsaws mostly use fixed speed AC universal motors with brushes (or DC for battery powered versions). While there may also be others still available, the only induction powered saws that I can recall are the old long discontinued E15 and E30 models from Stihl, which used 220v 50Hz single phase and 415v 50Hz three phase AC motors respectively. As a motor is "loaded", the current draw & torque output typically increase as the motor tries to maintain RPM's.

Thanks for that reply, I have learnt something, and hopefully some others will have too