Chainsaw Porting

Is Chainsaw Porting Worth It?

jon conner wrote:Is Chainsaw Porting Worth It?

No.

Why not just buy a larger saw with more CC's and have power right out of the box. Manufactures go to great lengths to ensure their chainsaws are the lightest possible for the most horsepower.... BUT are strong enough to withstand years of use. Porting ruins all that.

If you find yourself in need of more power, then I would suggest buying a bigger chainsaw, or learning to sharpen your chainsaw so that you get better use out of it than what you are currently getting.

Porting a chainsaw.  That's a pretty extensive mod!  Significant surgery to the saw.

Porting a chain saw

Hi jon,


Welcome to Permies.

Steve Zoma wrote:

jon conner wrote:Is Chainsaw Porting Worth It?

No.

Why not just buy a larger saw with more CC's and have power right out of the box. Manufactures go to great lengths to ensure their chainsaws are the lightest possible for the most horsepower.... BUT are strong enough to withstand years of use. Porting ruins all that.

If you find yourself in need of more power, then I would suggest buying a bigger chainsaw, or learning to sharpen your chainsaw so that you get better use out of it than what you are currently getting.

My personal thoughts are a little different.  I've done this kind of work on motors.  I don't think it's a matter of strength, I think it's the simple matter that doing this type of work to every engine isn't cost effective for the manufacturer.  Smoothing and polishing surfaces is meticulous work and isn't well suited to mass manufacturing.  same with very exacting matching of parts.  A properly ported engine will make more power and run cooler, which in turn increases service life.  "Properly" being the key word.  It isn't hard to do, but it is something you need to be careful with, take your time, and not overdo.

You could just buy a larger saw for $6-700.00, or you could spend a few hours of your time making your saw better.  Like most things, it comes down to the same question.  Do you have time, or do you have money?

I'm with Trace.

Porting a saw will make it faster, give you more throttle response and it will run cooler which translates to more longevity, not less. You are taking a mass produced machine and exactly matching you intake, exhaust and transfers to basically perfect your individual unit. What I really like about it, as opposed to just buying a bigger saw is that you are getting the performance of the big one without the added weight.

What are you using the chainsaw for?

I have used mine fairly extensively and I have found that other than on a chainsaw mill, my 461 Stihl had plenty of power in a nice weight to power ratio and did most of what I wanted it to do. My 365 Husqvarna was underpowered, but still I used it to cut down a 52 inch diameter Rock Maple.

Chainsaw milling requires a LOT of power, but a lot of that too is in using the right skip tooth ripping chain, and keeping it sharp. Even then, there are better options now with low-cost band sawmills that waste less wood, and cost less when the chainsaw is calculated in.

Seems a bit like a solution in search of a problem. Others definitely right about mass-manufacturing vs. hand-fitting, so "is it worth it?" is more a question of "is it worth my time?".
If I had a running saw, I'd leave it be, and use it.
If I had a saw that needed work, maybe? But I'd more likely just give it a tune-up and call it good.
If it was a free-to-me saw because it needed a major rebuild, and I was going to entertain myself doing that, why the hell not!

You may be mistaking terminology, in my experience
- Porting involves altering the shape and height of the ports to change the timing
- matching ports is the function of smoothing and aligning the parts so no lips etc are in place,
 sometimes gaskets hand over the edge of castings also.
As stated a few times, both these actions can improve performance, but sometimes it does not!!