Well folks, I just got held up by a guy in a red vest, not even wearing a mask or holding a weapon! I was cutting some wood and as fate will have it, I put the bar tip into the dirt! Never a good thing. Being so early in the season, and due to my procrastinator nature, all my back up chains are dull. I decide to run up to the local big city hardware store that carries Stihl chain in the lengths I need. Please, no comments on my chain choice, I like Stihl chain, don't care for Oregon as much, it doesn't hold an edge as well in my cutting environments, anyway, I digress. So I need a chain now, so off I go. 20 miles later, I pick up my 3/8" 50, 91 driver chain and get to the register. The total with tax was $40.65!!! Well, unfortunately, I needed the chain, but I swear I will go back to an axe and crosscut saw before I spend another dime at their store! Off to Ebay, where I can get 2 of these same chains, with free shipping for the same money! I can only hope the people who set that price shart themselves in a public setting. Ok, I feel better, my rant is over. Now out to the garage and start filing some chain.
It wouldn't of been much worse, I would of left a young innocent cashier with a chain and a new way to string bad words into a sentence, LOL.
My local stihl store sells non safety stihl chain for only few more dollars than online. $7 in my case, so not horrible. I feel the same way though about Oregon chains. They don't seem to start sharp as long as stihl chains.
The combination of not having what I want , standing in line forever , the 45 minute drive to nearest town with any stores , my limited time to shop and high prices have driven me to 90% of my purchases online as well as keeping a good inventory of everything .
Yep I think you know your mistake was not having those spare chains sharp and ready to go. Everyone can rock or hit dirt when out cutting and sometimes even a file is not going to help out. And yes I think you got robbed too.
Every Oct. my Stihl dealer ( All Seasons Equipment ) down the street from me runs a sale buy one get one free. So I get 2 chains for under $30.00. For my Tree Service tenant he gets that deal year round so I now have him pick up the chains if I need them. I feel the pain and I have to be honest if I had to pay $40.00 for one chain I would have told them I just wanted to buy one chain not the store. I bought the same sharpener as the dealer uses, he ordered it for me and that really helps cut my cost on chains. They now charge $11.00 plus tax, $11.88 a chain to sharpen them.
I tend to buy most things on line. Save a heck of a lot of time and some money. Teaches you a good habit of buying ahead so you are prepared, and it cuts out a lot of impulse buying.
Welp, its a dreary, drizzly day today, so I got out the Granberg file jig and took care of those dull chains. Weather supposed to be better tomorrow so I can get back to cutting.
My local dealer, who is mostly interested in renting skidsteers and concrete mixers is no peach to buy a chain from either. .325 x .50 gauge 80 drivelinks for my 550 was 33.65$. The old dealer which was more of a "saw" shop used to sell me 3/8 93 drive link for 31 even. I will buy all chain online noe also.
We have several tree services in the area, but Northern Indiana isn't known for logging so a bona fide saw shop does not exist around me. We had a Stihl dealer in town but St. Joseph county ran him out of business by jacking up taxes on small business owners a couple years ago and he had to shut down. So for me from now on, its online I go for saw chain.
I live about 5 to 6 miles outside of a small town, and most of those vendors, supermarkets included tend to jack up their prices vs what I would pay if I went to the city which is about 65 miles from me. I'm not saying all of the vendors are that way. There is a small hardware store in town and a lumberyard/hardware store that have their prices lower than the big box stores in the city. However .............. I will never have something delivered from that lumberyard/hardware store. I had ordered 36 railroad cross ties, and only received 32. When questioned about it, they said they would deliver them when they came in. Well, that was 5 months ago. I have been back since, and still none. I have expressed my displeasure! I'm currently in the process of building a retaining wall with those cross ties and I will be short! I guess one way or another your going to get ripped off, be it through price gouging or not receiving what you paid for (plus delivery). The only reason I keep going back is because their prices are consistently low while the quality is a step above the big box stores. But they have left a bad taste in my mouth that I just can't seem to get rid of! I too order online as much as possible to bypass these greedy price gougers!
get a good bench grinder and all of the worries go away If you are like me, you pick up a few new chains each year at the logging shows so there are always plenty of extras both sharp and needing to be sharpened.
