Bar oil in ...the gas tank

buckthorn · April 25, 2020, 01:30:28 PM

Apologies for cross-posting, but long story short, this morning I accidentally poured the bar oil and fuel mix into the wrong tanks. I emptied the tanks, and finally got the saw started (lots of smoke at first), but it's not happy. It ran (and cut) for about ten minutes, but now it dies after a minute or two. Is there any hope of clearing out the engine by running and restarting, running, restarting, etc. Or are more drastic measures necessary, which probably means taking it to the shop to clean out the carbs...? I hope I'm not the first person to pull such an idiotic stunt....

barbender · April 25, 2020, 01:45:48 PM

Well first, you're not the first person to pull this stunt. I think I did it once but caught myself cross filling the bar oil before I got to the gas tank. As far as anyone reading this, if you do dump bar oil in your gas tank, dump it out and then get out some ether or carb cleaner and spray the tank out well and let it dry before refilling with gas. Buckthorn, I would start by dumping the fuel tank again, and then change the in tank fuel filter. Hopefully it did its job and your problem will end there.

pine · April 25, 2020, 02:25:21 PM

I would have triple rinsed the fuel tank before I started the engine. Oh well you did not.
Since you did not the filter is probably corrupted as barbender stated; do a triple rinse and then replace it .
Carb cleaner will work if that is what you want but I would do a triple of it as well to ensure the remnants are gone.
Overkill yes but hey that is better than wishing you had done it and didn't.

As to the oil tank. Don't use your normal refill pattern. Refill it twice as often for 2-3 fuel tank loads. That way the oil dilution that happened is reduced faster. IE if you do the oil tank with each feuel fill like most then do an oil fill at the mid point for 2 to 3 tanks of fuel.

buckthorn · April 25, 2020, 02:41:59 PM

Thanks to you both. I'll try your suggestions. Would you consider Seafoam a carb cleaner? That's just what I happen to have around. Thanks again.

sawguy21 · April 25, 2020, 03:39:43 PM

Rinse the tank thoroghly with straight gas, change the filter then put in fresh mix. It will need a little coaxing until the bar oil is run through and burned off. Seafoam won't hurt anything.

Hilltop366 · April 25, 2020, 05:00:51 PM

Now to prevent this I try to always refill my saw in the same order every time to avoid accidentally getting them mixed up.

I grab the gas jug first and will only open one tank at a time on the saw.

sawguy21 · April 25, 2020, 05:09:24 PM

It happens frequently particularly on the top handle saws where the caps are adjacent. I have been known to do it on Echos which I sold. :

ammoaddict · April 25, 2020, 05:35:21 PM

Quote from: buckthorn on April 25, 2020, 01:30:28 PM
Apologies for cross-posting, but long story short, this morning I accidentally poured the bar oil and fuel mix into the wrong tanks. I emptied the tanks, and finally got the saw started (lots of smoke at first), but it's not happy. It ran (and cut) for about ten minutes, but now it dies after a minute or two. Is there any hope of clearing out the engine by running and restarting, running, restarting, etc. Or are more drastic measures necessary, which probably means taking it to the shop to clean out the carbs...? I hope I'm not the first person to pull such an idiotic stunt....

I bought one of the Husqvarna Combi cans and almost did this myself. I caught myself just in the nick of time.

thecfarm · April 25, 2020, 05:51:31 PM

Just about the same as hitting the log stops on a sawmill. Everyone does it. ;D

Don P · April 25, 2020, 07:02:45 PM

Ah you ruined the fun cf, I was gonna say "I can't believe anyone would do that" :D
It'll clean up.

Air Lad · April 25, 2020, 08:41:00 PM

Quote from: buckthorn on April 25, 2020, 01:30:28 PM
Apologies for cross-posting, but long story short, this morning I accidentally poured the bar oil and fuel mix into the wrong tanks. I emptied the tanks, and finally got the saw started (lots of smoke at first), but it's not happy. It ran (and cut) for about ten minutes, but now it dies after a minute or two. Is there any hope of clearing out the engine by running and restarting, running, restarting, etc. Or are more drastic measures necessary, which probably means taking it to the shop to clean out the carbs...? I hope I'm not the first person to pull such an idiotic stunt....

Not by a country mile buckthorn. Mate. I even left the oil cap off once
and diddn't notice till my leg felt wet while cutting. Poured out the just refilled tank and got a lot of sawdust in instead. Great chance to learn about the internal works of an oilpump. smiley_brick hits_hardhat

buckthorn · April 25, 2020, 10:25:07 PM

Well, I rinsed the gas tank several times and replaced the filter, put in fresh fuel mix. At first it started up and ran for a minute or two, and then it died. Then I couldn't get it to start again. I pulled out the plug and cleaned it off, as it was wet. Now it doesn't want to start again, except that it does start for a second if I use full choke, but then it quickly dies. I can't get it to go at all at other positions, except for maybe a split second, but that might change if I put it down for an hour and then try again. At this point, it's hard to even know which position to put the switch in when I try to start it again and again.

square1 · April 26, 2020, 06:11:50 AM

I used to have one hard and fast rule about refueling. Fill the bar oil reservoir each and every time I add fuel. I have added a 2nd hard and fast rule. Oil in the oil tank, fuel in the fuel tank ;)

Did I miss you saying you put in a new spark pkug?

buckthorn · April 26, 2020, 09:42:20 AM

I usually do the same thing. I cleaned the plug. I'm going to try pulling and cleaning. Maybe the screens are gummed up. That should help. Can't hurt, anyway.

samandothers · April 26, 2020, 10:05:45 AM

Yep done this 3 times I remember, same saw. Small Echo top handle where the gas cap is next to the bar. I get to thinking about something other than what I am doing. I have been fortunate only had to rinse each time and ran afterwards without issues.

Hilltop366 · April 26, 2020, 10:45:31 AM

Once you foul up a plug they are never the same, a new plug would be better, second best is to heat the electrode up with a torch and clean.

Here is what I do.

When you have the plug out hold the throttle wide open and pull the engine over rapidly a bunch of times to try and clean it out.

Install plug and try to start without choke with full throttle, if it starts try to apply as much throttle as possible until it runs cleanly at full throttle.

If not try normal cold start procedure and get to full throttle asap to clean it out.

I will add that there is a safety issue starting a saw at full throttle no choke with a modern saw with the trigger lock interconnected with the choke, you have to hold the throttle with one had and pull the saw with the other so you are not in full control of the saw when it starts. Options are strap the saw to something solid, apply chain brake until you have control of saw or remove bar and chain.

buckthorn · April 27, 2020, 09:17:42 PM

I've started working on cleaning the carburetor. It's my first time doing this, and I realized too late that undoing one of those phillips screws would allow that tiny spring assembly with the inlet control lever and the inlet needle to pop out. How is that assembly supposed to go together, and how do I get it back in there correctly? I just wanted to spray some cleaner in there and then reassemble the whole thing.

To be honest, the outside of the carburetor looked worse than the rest of it; even the screens didn't look too bad. Lots of caked, oily sawdust all around the outside.

I have to take a couple of days off before I can return to finish the job.

buckthorn · May 01, 2020, 02:13:04 PM

Well folks, I cleaned out the carburetor, which actually didn't look bad. Put everything back together, and the saw behaves the same as before. It will start, will idle for a few seconds but then cuts out. If I give it gas, it will run briefly, and then cut out. I could replace the plug, but does this sound like a plug issue?

I have some smaller cutting jobs to do on the property, but I'm going to have to use my 261 until I can bring this smaller saw back to life.

Any more suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Al_Smith · May 02, 2020, 04:48:57 PM

My dad at nearly 80 years old oiied the gas twice in the same week on a PM 610 McCulloch .At that time WD -40 used propane as a propellant .Simple enough .Start it on Wd-40 and dead stick it until it cleared up .It didn't hurt anything .Fact I inherited that saw and it still runs great or did the last time I used it .

sawguy21 · May 02, 2020, 04:56:37 PM

:D I have done that with lots of white smoke.

Al_Smith · May 02, 2020, 05:04:46 PM

I'm not sure if I've ever oiled the gas but I have put a chain on backwards ,cut the dirt and killed one saw with a straight gas prime by not paying attention
. .

sawguy21 · May 02, 2020, 08:08:15 PM

Al, Al, Al, what are we going to do do with you? :D

WDH · May 02, 2020, 08:19:46 PM

If it has a spark arrester screen in the muffler, make sure that the screen is not stopped up or take it out and then run the saw without it to see if the saw will run normally.