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Re: chain saw rec/saws to avoid?

To: ericm@lne.com
Subject: Re: chain saw rec/saws to avoid?
From: Trevor Boicey <trevor@boicey.com>
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 2006 16:33:41 -0400
ericm@lne.com wrote:
> ls motorcycle will idle for about two minutes on a bowl
> full of gas.  Of course it's still getting oil with the premix for
> that time.  I wouldn't run it WFO to get rid of the gas
> in the carb, since it does go lean for the last few seconds.

   Yah, my email was a little bit garbled, that's what happens when you 
want to fire off one email then go to lunch.

   What I meant to say is that I have "no strong opinion", I wouldn't 
preach to anyone who likes to run it dry that death is imminent.

   It's a bigger deal with a multi carb engine. The exact examples that 
often get brought up are the 50s and 60s Mercury outboard "towers", that 
are inline 4s and inline 6s, with two and three carbs respectively, very 
popular in the hobby.

   My inline 4 is here:

http://www.brit.ca/~tboicey/boats/feathercraft.jsp

   Each carb fuels (and lubricates) two cylinders. Running it dry is 
considered "bad", since it's very possible one carb will keep the engine 
running for a long time after the other has run out of gas.

   So two cylinders are still spinning around, doing compression cycles, 
and maybe even occasionally firing, without adequate lubrication.

   ...pretty big deal when, like you say, a small motor can run two 
minutes at idle on a bowl of gas. That's a long time if one pair of 
cylinders is effectively running dry.

   Again, I have no strong opinion, but that is an argument that is 
often raised when discussing whether to run them dry, or the opposite, 
kill them with the choke so they get stored extra-wet.




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