Drain gas for storage, bar oil too?

[edge]

When letting a saw sit for an extended time period, obviously most of us drain gas and/or run dry at idle.

Should the bar/chain oil be drained as well, or is it ok to let that remain in the saw?  

I don't know if bar/chain oil can break down like gas and cause damage...or if it is ok to leave in the saw.

[SasquatchMan]

Biological oils will turn to resin if left for too long, but the ordinary run of the mill bar lube can be left in.

[sigidi]

not too hard to err on the side of caution - imho.

I'd drain it anyways, no big deal and definately no trouble if the oil does go 'off'

[Ianab]

As an experiment....

Leave a loosely capped jar of 2 stroke mix and a jar of bar oil on the workshop shelf for 6 months

at a guess.. the 2 stoke mix will have evaporated to a thin layer of slimey varnish. The bar oil will still look like bar oil.

You can see why you dont want the old gas mix in your carb when you try and fire up the saw after 6 months, but the oil should still be OK

Ian

[rvrdivr]

When storing any of my gas engines for a extended period of time, I will add a fuel stabilizer, run the engine, drain remaining gas, then run engine dry. This way any gas that's left in the system should stay gum free.
I wouldn't be concerned about the oil unless I was storing for a very long time.

[Kevin]

Don't forget to back the chain off when storing your saw.

[SasquatchMan]

Hey come one Kevin, I'm sure everyone takes the bar right off and cleans off the housing with 300 Q-tips and vacuums out the cylinder fins before they store a machine! :D

[Lewis Brander]

At the end of each day a person should go through and check their saws over, loose screws, chain sharpening/adjusting and cleaning ( preventitive maintanence), so that the saw will run at its peak the next day. Before storing a saw I completely clean it, sharpen and adjust the chain, idle the saw dry of fuel (yes I use fuel stabil) and I remove the plug and put in a squirt or 2 of good oil in the cylinder and crank over a couple times. If the saw is to sit for an extended period I'll even squirt a bit of oil through the carb and crank her over to lubricate the bottom end. I usually leave the bar oil in the saw. Most of my saws have a manuel oil pumg on them, so during storage, I'll spin the chain and reoil them with the manuel pump. JMO, so take it for what its worth. Lewis.