Reader Reviews
I recently bought one of these at Home Depot for my father. He decided that he wanted to try going to an electric saw because of all the problems with keeping a gas one running. I tried it out by cutting all the dead out of a large 35 year old Globe Willow Tree in the front yard. At first I was impressed with the power of the saw verses how light it was compared with the gas ones. Keeping the power cord from getting tangled with the cut off limbs was kind of a hassle. Then after less than an hour of run time on the saw it started throwing the chain off. After the second time it threw the chain off I examined the chain cover with the "easy tension adjustment knob". The plastic that held the nut on the tension screw had broken and the nut on the tension screw had split into two pieces and the threads on the tension screw had stripped. Apparently the pressure of the chain pulling against the tension adjustment set-up was too much for the cheap material that it was made out of. As a machinist with over 20 years experience I was surprised to see a part that would be under a lot of pressure and vibration being made out of cheap light plastic. And the tension screw was only 3/16 dia. mild steel. The side cover should be made of cast aluminum and the tension screw should be at least a 1/4-20 hardened screw. Even tho I didn't have any problem getting Home Depot to replace the saw I'm still very disappointed with the cheap materials that it is made out of. I'm sure that it will happen again and I'm just wondering how many times I can get it replaced. This is another example of the trend of us American consumers having to settle for items either made in 3rd world countries and imported or made out of parts made in 3rd world countries and assembled here in the states. We used to take pride in our quality and craftsmanship in our American made products. Now its make it as cheap as possible to get more profits out of it. And so what if it breaks, people will just throw it away and buy another one.