What is the best chain for cutting slabwood?

[Billy Bee]

My son is running 2 different saws for cutting slabwood bundles. A 272XP and a 455 rancher. The 272XP is running a 36in. bar with a full skip chain. The 455 has a (regular?) chain on a 20in. bar. He is leaving the bundles banded and burying the saw into the bundle to cut as many as possible in one cut. Both chains were new. The full skip requires sharpening after no more than 2 cuts, the chain on the rancher kept cutting well through several cuts, enough to go through a tank of fuel. We don't really know what the visual differences are between full chisel, semi chisel, anti kickback, etc. So we don't know what these chains are, they were made at a dealer 100 miles away, so hard to ask what the difference is. Anyway, one cuts just as well as the other, but lasts much longer without sharpening. What do you guys think is the difference? What chain do you recommend for cutting green hardwood slabwood?
We have 20 more bundles coming. Bundles are about 4ft. in diameter and 10ft. long.
Thanks, Bill

 

[RandyT]

The problem is slab wood is the bark. the bark traps the dirt and rocks and other debris from the skidding process. I suspect the difference between the two chains is the 272XP with the big bar has full chisel chain, which if you look at the cutter will have a square corner. Full chisel will cut faster that the semi-chisel which by the way has a question mark shape, but full chisel doesn't like dirt.

Anti kickback is a safety feature that helps prevent the cutters from digging in when they go around the nose of the bar. Therefore there is less chance of the operator wearing the chainsaw when it flips up at them. The downside of anti-kickback is it makes hard for the nose of the bar to cut through a piece of wood if the bar is buried.

 

[oosik]

Running a unit with a 36" bar. WoW - somebody is a real horse. Around here - years ago I would cut my ancient Ponderosa Pine - firewood. The ONLY time the saw ever touched bark - when felling the trees.

MT ST Helens erupted - 1980. To this very day the bark is choked with volcanic ash. This ash does two things to the chain on a saw - quickly dulls - shines to a high polished finish.

I would "skin" the fallen trees at each/every cut spot. Pine skins easily. Only had to resharpen two or three time a day.

Whatever - I would go with the unit that stay sharp longer. Obviously - one type chain is much more tolerant of "crud".

 

[Billy Bee]

Randy, I am pretty sure you nailed it. I looked up the stihl chainsaw chain site, and got an education on different styles of chain. they reccomend full chisel for clean wood as it dulls easily with dirt embedded wood such as is the case with our slabwood. Semi chisel will apparently tolerate a little more dirt, thus lasting longer between sharpenings. I think the 272 must be running full chisel, and the rancher must have semi chisel. Neither one is anti kickback. At first we thought the problem was the full skip, but now I think it is the difference in the cutters.
oosic, you must have got up before the chickens, you are 3 hours behind us. Around here nobody burns pine except in outdoor boilers for fear of chimney fires. Maybe Ponderosa pine is better than the conifers in Michigan. I don't think it grows here.
Thanks guys, Bill

 

[Egon]

The one bar is almost double the length of the other bar. The teeth will encounter more wood on the long bar.

 

[s219]

Yep, Randy nailed it. I use both types of chain but historically have preferred semi-chisel for production cutting since it requires far fewer breaks for sharpening, and when you're cutting all day long that adds up to a chunk of time.

Right now I am running some full chisel on my 562XP since it's what I had new in the box when I needed to grab another chain, but boy does it dull a lot quicker than my normal semi-chisel. I'm just cutting firewood so no big deal, but if I was clearing land all this sharpening would get old real quick.

I will say this, the full chisel reminds me of a lithium-ion battery in a power tool -- gives you near-100% performance and then just dies. Goes from cutting great and throwing chips to cutting poorly and throwing dust. Semi-chisel takes a lot longer to go between those extremes and you get a lot more feedback that it's starting to dull before it's time to sharpen.

 

[s219]

The one bar is almost double the length of the other bar. The teeth will encounter more wood on the long bar.

It gets complicated -- assuming the sprocket RPM and chain speed is the same, and all else equal (ie, same cutters, same cutters per inch, same size wood) the longer bar/chain combo will last longer -- the longer chain makes fewer revolutions than the short chain. It becomes like a gearing issue of sorts. If you start comparing different cutters, skip versus standard, etc, then it's harder to make sense of it.

 

[Oldoak]

It gets complicated -- assuming the sprocket RPM and chain speed is the same, and all else equal (ie, same cutters, same cutters per inch, same size wood) the longer bar/chain combo will last longer -- the longer chain makes fewer revolutions than the short chain. It becomes like a gearing issue of sorts. If you start comparing different cutters, skip versus standard, etc, then it's harder to make sense of it.

It don't think it's all that complicated. If all things were equal, I would agree the longer bar and chain would last longer. But the reason being the longer chain has more teeth sharing the work. Fewer teeth on the shorter bar and chain would dull faster when cutting the same amount of wood.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

A 272 with a 36" bar???? Don't you mean a 372??

SR

 

[Billy Bee]

A 272 with a 36" bar???? Don't you mean a 372??

SR

It is for sure a 272 xp it is old but runs like a top. I think it is the previous model to the 372. He just bought the 36in. bar, it had a 20in. on it.