So why does smoke rise from the muffler every time I shut off my vintage saws?

[MelonBoi1]

I am just confused as to why smoke always rises from the muffler of my vintage chainsaws when I turn them off after using them or running them for a while, is this normal? My Dayton does it, my homelite does it, my john deere does it, and my mcculloch does it. Any reason why? Should I be concerned or is it normal.

[Ianab]

Saws shut down by shorting out the spark plug. As it's still spinning and sucking in fuel, it's going to do a couple of revolutions before it stops, and end up with un-burned  fuel / oil in the still hot cylinder / muffler. Hence some smoke is probably normal. 

[Al_Smith]

I'll give  a tip .Never wind one up and hit the kill switch at wide open throttle .Chances are if you do it will flood .Actualy cause a partial hydrolock .  I did that like a moron at sawfest on a souped up Stihl 038 magnum .Had it not been for another kind fellow I never would have gotten it to start . Worse part of it I knew better .Transient brain fart evidently .

[rusticretreater]

Since they are vintage, maybe some of the oil has accumulated in the exhaust passages and gets heated up being near the muffler. Since all of your saws do it, there is a common denominator.  Maybe the oil you use in your mix is the issue or just the way you run the saws as noted in a previous post.

[Al_Smith]

I am just confused as to why smoke always rises from the muffler of my vintage chainsaws when I turn them off after using them or running them for a while, is this normal? 

You most likely answered your own question by using one word --vintage --- Most older chainsaws used impulse activated oil pumps that with time every one of them leaks into the crankcase .Logic would most certainly say trying to burn heavy lubricating oil the saw would smoke to beat the band . My advice is don't get too worried about it .

[Spike60]

Simple answer for me is that my old saws are just plain dirty. (Under the covers that I clean up so they  look good that is.) Although I run them with the same 40:1 mix I run in everything. They were no doubt run for years on 16, 25, or 32:1. There's a lot of that residue that will smoke after I shut them off. I'm suppose that after enough run time, it would mostly go away. But if it did, I'd surely miss it. I love that old saw aroma; it's part of the experience. 

[Al_Smith]

I might add owning a lot of older saws if they had sat a long time not started they will blow smoke like they are burning soft coal .The leaky impulse oilers will have leaked into the crankcase .That will stop after a little run time however they would seldom cook themselves from a lean run condition .Little things like that is why they'll run almost forever .