Vintage Stihl

That may very well be next in line!

 

It came very highly recommended!!!

 

Thanks Eric! And I'm very appreciative of the interest in this project. We've all sung the praises of this great FHC family time after time, but it never gets old . . . how enjoyable for one member to do another member a HUGE favor and then several more members all chime in with helpful thoughts and tips. WE will get through this project and maybe . . . just maybe . . . once this joker is making chips again after laying in rest for so long it'll be the FHC "Chainsaws & Power Equipment" forum mascot!!!

 

MMO, pb blaster, eh, all of the other products are nothing compared to kroil. Yes, it's mail order only, but it's literally several times better than any other penetrating oil.

Seeing that old stihl logo has me wondering when they stopped using the log in the stihl logo?


My grandpa's old 015l I got has that same logo.

 

KROIL! Sweet sassy mo-lassy - I've been trying to remember that since we started discussing penetrating oil. Thank you for that. Years ago I worked with some millwrights who specialized in rigging and they always bragged on Kroil. Hell, one of them swore that if you filled a cast-iron skillet with Kroil it would eventually leak out the bottom!

 

Hello guys, I am new here, I am the one that sold Beau the top cover. I assure you, in this instance he has used the term "expert" very loosely. I have done exhaustive research on the early 1106 series saws and I do have some rare documentation, and I may have one or two Contra and Lightning saws as well, but I am still learning every day. I too have had the frustrating situation Beau is going through here as well.

Keep in mind this saw has seen some use, so the top portion of the cylinder where the rings ride is going to have wear, probably minor, but still some wear so this portion of the cylinder diameter is going to be minutely larger than the bottom of the bore. Also keep in mind that this saw more than likely has been stored without climate control, it meant a little less to a guy in 1960 than it does us saw collectors today. In the PNW, that is 50 +/- years of freezing and thawing, so lots of chances for condensation to form both below and above rings, so 50 +/- years of corrosion growth. Even in the assembled state, there is a gap in the rings, so once the crank is rotated down to where the rings come in contact with any kind of corrosion in bore, turning the crank further only tightens the rings tighter to the piston in a clamping fashion until all you want to do is smash the hell out of it and move on to another project. It can be very frustrating.

Next we need to consider the wrist pin, you can't see the sides of the bore, only the intake and exhaust side. The saw was obviously taken out of service for some reason, did it lose a wrist pin clip and lock the wrist pin to side wall of cylinder? While rare, I have seen it happen, I've actually had to use a cut off wheel and split the cylinder in half on a 088 in the past only to find out that is exactly what had happened.

Here is my suggestion, this has worked for me on a Contra S that was in the same condition as yours. First you need to send piston back up bore, not a lot, I'm talking .050" would be enough. Turn saw upside down, get Kroil underneath rings and let set overnight. Put a block of wood or one of the "U" shaped piston stops between cylinder and crankcase. Put flywheel back on saw and mark the furthest point you can turn flywheel. Work back and forth over the course of a few days. Once you can get just a 1/4" of movement, you can use the weighted inertia of flywheel as a hammer and just work at it slowly rotating back and forth until you get more and more rotation. Keep an eye that whatever block you use is clear of the piston skirts. The bottom of the rings will eventually chip away at any corrosion on the cylinder walls. I wouldn't recommend any excessive force. While OEM cylinders are rare, they are out there, it's easier to replace the cylinder than the crank. If you break something, I am sure I have a replacement, most of the time when things get broken, it is more likely impatience that caused it than not. Be careful spraying any kind of penetrating oil in there with the saw upside down and then throwing heat to it. With the saw upside down, the crankcase will be a nice cavity to trap fumes, then apply an open flame, and I assure you, that cylinder coming off will be the least of your concerns. Also, if you twist off the end of the crank, you are going to need an entire rotating assembly and cylinder. Before destroying crank, last resort would be to split cylinder in half, but that is absolute last resort.

Guys, this saw is a pretty scarce find, the cylinder isn't near the rarest part of this saw. Any time you run across a Contra without the manual oiler on the oil tank, has green rubber instead of black on the wrap handle or the closed top air filter like the one Beau has here, jump on it. These early saws are getting tougher and tougher to find.

Sorry for the long winded post. I hope this helps, I have yet to meet Beau, but I am here and close enough to offer any help or parts you may need. I'll help you see to it that this early style Contra lives to eat at least one more piece of wood before you put it back on the shelf for its rightful retirement.

Brad

 

That sir, is an amazing first post. Welcome to the asylum. Hope you come back often .

 

That is an amazing first post Brad, and for the record, you're the closest thing to an expert I 'know' on these saws, so I'm holding strong on that designation!

That is all very good advice, and the thought of crud/buildup accumulating in the ring end gaps causing the tightness is both brilliant as well as something that hadn't crossed my mind (due to utter lack of brilliance, I assume). It'll be awhile (1 week?) before I get back onto that project, but after reading your carefully described procedure my only concern at the moment is that I have the piston removed to the point where less than 1/16" of the wrist pin is still hidden above the base (both retainer clips intact & in position). Hell, I spend a lot of time trying to get that last tiny bit just so I could remove the wrist pin and take the p/c off. That said, the cylinder is too high for the studs to get through to let me install the nuts and make it solid to then install the flywheel and attempt to move the piston as you've described. From here I need to figure out a safe & effective way to push the cylinder back down a good ways...

Also, the flammable vapor buildup in an inverted crankcase is an excellent point to bring up, but I personally never use open flames for heating - heat gun only for me . . . exactly for reasons like that. Safety first, and all safe advice is good advice!

Thank you for all of that Brad, and thank you for your willingness to continue assisting me on this project!

 

Is the cylinder flange above the studs? I am guessing no if you can't rotate the cylinder. Good news is the wrist pin clips are still intact. The fact that you know that tells me you are damm close. Too bad this isn't one of your 090s where you could get a straight shot at the top of the piston through the plug hole. That would make this a lot easier, then you could go through plug hole and whack at top of piston until it let go. I've got cylinders and pistons if you destroy something beyond repair. I've put Harleys together from boxes and milk crates full of parts, I'm not gonna let a damm saw get me down. One way or another, we will get that thing to run. We might replace everything except the bar studs, but I'm always willing to help someone make an 1106 run again.

 

Yes, the top of the cylinder base is above the bar studs. If I rotate the crank so that the con-rod is in the lowest position the longer front studs will just barely get to the holes in the cylinder, but not protrude to where I could thread a nut. And the rear shorter studs fall short.

I appreciate the optimism and willingness to help me finish this regardless of what I may or may not destroy! Next week when I'm back working on this saw I'll post some pics of exactly where things stand right now.

STATUS REPORT: Right now it's soaking in Marvel Mystery Oil (upside down with the cylinder & piston submerged), and my Kroil arrived today...

 

Yea, I'll stick around and see how it goes, I've been a member on other sites for a while. Those didn't pan out so well, I don't care to read about pizzing matches and none of this is very serious stuff to me. I just like building saws. I will say it seems a bit odd for me to join a site called firewood hoarders being that I heat with natural gas and my firewood pile would fit in a wheel barrow cause it's only for the occasional backyard fire pit. Ah, what the hell, I've done stranger things. I do always have a decent sized hardwood log on the stand outside my shop to test saws in, but I don't see me hoarding anything other than saws in the near future....

 

Whatever floats your boat, your welcome here. No pizzing here, the members don't allow it. It's not the average forum.

 

That's exactly why I (and presumably many others) hang out here when I'm online . . . no egos, just a bunch of good guys keeping it fun. No fights about brand preference, port timing, pop-up pistons, etc. I always chuckle at how serious folks get; like my buddy Joe always says, "They're just chainsaws!".

You're not alone with a not-so-perfect fit on the sites title. I heat with geothermal, but do have a woodstove insert that gets occasional use for ambiance or supplemental heating (i.e. tomorrow night with a low of 3 degrees F!).

 

I don't want to knock marvel mystery oil, if it's all you have, by all means use it, it has its place and is amazing stuff. Just my 2 cents, this is an application where I'd use Kroil hands down over MMO. Both excellent, but for freeing sludge, corrosion, and gunk, Kroil is second to none from my experience. If you don't have time so mess with it, leave it in the marinade of MMO, but if I had 5 minutes, I'd lay the Kroil to it. I had a Knucklehead motor that was left for a boat anchor years ago, I had used every concoction known to man and was content with using it as art on a shelf until an old flat track racer brought me a can of Kroil and told me that would free it up, he wasn't lying, I think it must have holy water or pixie dust or something in it. I swear by it now.

 

Kroil is next on the menu, but I figured I would let is soak in MMO (available everywhere) until the Kroil came in (ordered online). There's a very small chance I'll have an opportunity to clean it up and hit it with Kroil tomorrow or Saturday, but then I'll be out of town for a bit. Generally speaking I'm a very patient man, but it kills me to not know how this p/c challenge is going to end up...

 

Yes, supposed to be 3 degrees here tomorrow as well, this all got started for me when I moved to Grand Rapids and had a choice between propane or a Central Boiler, so I went with the boiler and cut a lot of wood. Then I got so caught up in building saws that I started trading saw for loads of logs that I would just buck up to 30" lengths to feed the boiler. Now I'm just a saw addict. I am brand biased for the orange and white saws, but it is very slight. Depending on size of saw I want to use, I could be running a Stihl, Husky, Solo, Jred, Efco, Poulan, Homelite, Olympyk, Mac....come to think of it, I'm not really brand biased at all.

 

we have kroil at work, and i work in the aviation industry where dam near everything has an expiration date applied too it. So the perfectly good "expired" product must be removed from the floor, thus thrown away or put into peoples lunch box's and taken home