Tools, Tips and Tricks

Hi Tom .
I’m not sure I understand correctly, do you mean that the pipes (boron blasting nozzle) are simply held in place by tightening?

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I have only used the hexaloy tubes but the boron ones are the same idea. I have welded the pipe nipple to the wall of the fire tube. The nozzle is just slides into the steel nipple and is held in place by friction.

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I also got some that had a 3/4 NPT that will screw into threaded pipe from Bruce Southerland and that also held up very well , he found them on Ebay i think but if he reads this i am sure he will let us all know
With those Boron nozzles i just got a slight under plug fit and then heated to expand the tube to slide over the nozzle and just to make sure added a little furnace cement around just to stop any air leaks seemed to work a treat .
Here are 4 photo’s of the Boron nozzle that help up very well you can see what it looked like after i cleaned off the slag the ends are in perfect condition , the other 3 photo’s are of the nozzle that Bruce sent me this is 1 of 3 that i have not used yet as one is still in a downdraft charcoal gasifier .over 5 years now .







Dave

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Impressive, Dave. I think you’ve already mentioned this. I’d forgotten about those boron nozzles. Are they fragile and sensitive to impacts?

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They seem to hold up well to the knock and bangs i gave them , but i wouldn’t go hitting them with a hammer just in case , that first one i had to clean the slag off it and that was basically molten glass i think i was chipping away at him with a small hammer and a grinder to get it off and that’s after about 60 hours of heating and cooling cycles ,
I also have a piece of Tungsten Carbide that was totally untouched after running as a nozzle for a while , trouble is that’s not cheap even as scrap , plus i got stopped at every security desk at airports as it shows up as solid black on the X rays unable to be scanned and they all wanted to see what the object was .
Dave

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Hi All
Here is a tool I’ve recommended feedback:


My first NOCO Genius 1 failure.
I have six of these now. I cut it open to see if it was a design or manufacturing failure . . . Or a ME failure. Picture does not quite show the water droplets inside even after days drying by the wood stove.
Water inside, so it was a ME dumb-shit.

It’s lived months under maintaining charging the Hyundai battery. Normally living dry stretched over into the back of the GMC box van. It sat out on the hood edge in our rains. I forgot to stretch it over plugged in under cover.

Sheez. So I pulled some equipments batteries and lined up positives and negatives and will daily move and charge until I can get another new Genius 1 next month.

All-in-all using Aspen fuels as storage, and these 1 amp maintainer chargers has made my life turn-key, and one-two pulls starting confident.

Ha! Except now the pictured wood splitter! The cam mounted compression release is getting obviously worn. Only ~15+ years old. Sometimes it will kick pulling back hard. Damn that hurts.
Courage and determination SteveU.
Only 4-5 months more to use. And then in May/June fair weather, I can open it up and repair.

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Apparently you will need to order them from the US, the Chinese market doubled around July which is about when Trump put his tariffs in. I don’t think demand created a 100% jump in price for carbide over 6 months. This is FOB from China.

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May not help, but when we bought a former-rental BCS walk-behind tractor a few years back, it had a Honda GX390, with LOTS of hours. Smoked a little on start-up if it had been sitting, but ran okay. And it was cheap :slightly_smiling_face: I didn’t have to worry about putting the first scratch on it either.
But it did like to pull the starter handle through my fingers, which is not what I needed. I figured I’d deal with it later, since I didn’t like the idea of splitting the crankcase and replacing the compression release. But I wondered . . . it works by floating the intake valve when it’s turning slowly. How far open does it hold that valve? I pulled the valve cover, and checked the valve lash, which was well over spec. I reset the gap, put the cover back on, and no more kick-back. It’s run for, I think, three years now, mainly powering the splitter. Still smokes off and on, but no more sore fingers. At least, not from from that engine :slightly_frowning_face:
Might be worth a try.

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#1 reason why I like to buy used equipment. Price is #2 and might be tied, but not worrying about the first scratch or an out of warranty modification or future resale value, isn’t worth it. I’d rather let someone else do that.

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I was a big fan of using my battery drill and socket to start my engines way back in the early days , but of course that normaly ment taking off the fan cowl that helps keep the engine cool , well i came across these and realized this is what i needed !

Dave

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Is that going to be easier? It looks like you have to remove the shroud to get that on. then it isn’t really leveraged.

I’m reposting the link because the one you posted, wanted your credentials, when you post eliminate everything after the ? in the url, it is all the tracking information. and even after doing that, it wanted two verification method because it thought I was a bot… :slight_smile:

https://www.temu.com/au/red-hand-crank-starter--fast-pull-start--starter-assembly-compatible-with--ct200u-b200r-200cc-mini-bike-and-kt196-go-kart-crank-handle-start-for-honda-6-5--196--engine-small-engine-g-606347592629597.html?

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I have an Echo 590 chainsaw. The chain brake locked up on it a while back so I switched to a different saw. Decided to fix the Echo and no clue to what caused the problem but the chain brake mechanism on this saw is quite a bit more complicated that most other saws so it took a minute to get it disassembled. My older saws don’t even have chain brakes and when the one on my Husky screwed up I have used it for many years without one. Might do the same with the Echo but In case I want to do it right I wonder who knows of a reliable source of chain saw parts. In the past I have ordered from Steve’s small engine saloon and E parts and have gotten the wrong part from each.

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Tom,
I found this Echo factory parts lookup page. If you go to the page, there are many choices. Once you get through the menu structure, you get to the CS590 parts pages, and there are still more choices to make depending on the serial number of your saw. Clicking on the CS590 page of your saw’s serial number should reward you with an exploded view of the sub-assemblies, a parts list, and prices. I will post some example screen shots below. Is the service good? I have never used this, just trying to help out. I have a local dealer for Echo, and that would be my choice for a new saw… :cowboy_hat_face:
Link to Parts Lookup Page:
Parts Lookup | ECHO
Serial number page (screen shot):


Example Page (screen shot):

Example Page for a chain brake (screen shot).

Hope this helps!

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Thanks Mike. I think there may be a local place that sells Echo parts. I just hate to go driving around to find it. I prefer ordering stuff on-line but that sometimes bites me in the ass.

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I have gotten the right parts from jack’s before… but beware, they have a serial number ranges for this model so they may have made changes to the model.

https://www.jackssmallengines.com/jacks-parts-lookup/manufacturer/echo/chainsaws/chainsaws-cs/cs-590/cs-590-s-n-c25913001001-c25913999999/chain-brake

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What do you think it would cost to build a saw if you ordered every part from a dealer?

I order a carb for a stihl weed wacker from Jack’s and it was the wrong one as well, Sean. Then after some years that stihl screwed up but the carb was still good. Thanks for reminding me. This year I’m going to try and fix at least some of my broken stuff. I have a bunch of it. My default move is to just go buy another one.

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About 4-5x as much unless you are buying knockoff parts from aliexpress.

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I would guess 10x-20x if you count every nut, bolt and washer. Ali-Express… good luck with that. Tom, your time is valuable, too. Sometimes shortcuts are like: “That was expensive, but I now have what I needed”. :cowboy_hat_face:

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Here is one of the better video’s I have seen on fixing a power tool battery pack. There is a lot of information in it.

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The wood I am burning now is pretty straight grained Maple and trying to keep in some kind of shape I have been splitting a lot of it with a maul. I have been through more broken mauls than I can remember but I needed a new one to start next years supply. I was going to buy the Fiskar’s splitting axe for $70 but when I got to the store I saw this one for half the price and I liked the shape of the head.
https://www.menards.com/main/tools/hand-tools/axes-mauls/masterforce-reg-8-lb-splitting-maul-with-36-fiberglass-handle/tjr-8sof-men/p-4364363664906567-c-9121.htm
Plus the Fiskars is only 4.5 lbs and this is 8 which would seem to provide more force. I have a Fiskars long handle hatchet that I’ve used for years now and it’s still in good shape so that was a consideration I probably should have given more thought to. Now after a few weeks of use the head on the one I bought is starting to loosen. Same problem I’ve had with most fiberglass handled sledge hammers and mauls I have ever bought, On the other mauls the handles seem beefy enough but there has only been a 3/4 inch peg in the maul head and the rest of the space filled with some sort of epoxy. I’m guessing this one is the same. Wondering if anyone knows a good way to repair these things.

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