Different beast
I think they have to put one out to stay in the perceived niche market along w/oregon, sthil etc
I'd like to have one to play around with and I'm sure it'd have it's uses, but not at a "real" saw price (assuming they are in line w/the oregon etc)
The battery saws address different issues than a gas saw, for one, they have a much higher chance of actually starting and running for joe homeowner with occasional use. No fuel mix or anything to mess with, no endless yanking, etc. No fumes, no real loud noise, granny can start and run one easy and actually get something cut. As such the pricing is different.
I was just taking a gander at the high end battery drills..they cost hundreds of dollars, a lot..
some examples of higher end battery powered drills/impact drivers I am looking at on amazon now, dewalt 36 volt LiIon, (the rest vary on volts) 400 bucks, panasonic $390, Milwaukee $380, Makita $400, etc.
Looking at it that way, considering what sort of work a chainsaw has to do, moving a long cutting surface at high speed, compared to a little drill bit or socket, the high end battery saw prices are not out of line at all. It is what it is and you get what you pay for. You can get much cheaper battery saws of course, down under a hundred, the same as the battery drills, they do offer real cheap ones out there, but they simply won't cut the same or have as good a runtime.
Ya it is a niche product but all tools are niche products. We are chain saw enthusiasts here, do maintenance and like working on them etc..most people aren't and don't, but they still need to cut once in awhile.
It is the same with trimmers, edgers, blowers, mowers, pole saws, etc that folks buy, not for going out with a landscaping truck and using hard day after day, but for just getting the job done around the house. How many of those gasser devices fail to start and run reliably for those folks-the other 99% who aren't two stroke enthusiasts and work on them and do all the due diligence required- through the year, because of the inherent problems with crap gas and fuel line rot and gunked carbs and fouled plugs and dirty air filters and plugged screens in the mufflers and all that rot that happens to gassers? Millions...millions, and millions of small gasser evices *don't* work reliably for people, so that is what the new battery tech is addressing, simple as that, eliminating the "don't start, don't work, why this is a POS" syndrome.
Heck, if small gas devices did reliably work all the time, they wouldn't sell too many new ones every year. You can see mountains out back at most any small engine shop of don't work small gas devices that still look almost new, and are...but aren't reliable *enough* without being a fair enthusiast and mechanic.
Look at all the saw scores people get here that just need fuel lines and so on. Joe HO don't mess with that, doesn't want to, and never will, for the most part. He just wants to grab a tool and go to work, not stop what he is doing mid stride and have to take it to the shop or attempt to diagnose what is wrong and then go look for parts. And as soon as he drops something off at the small engine shop..instant sticker shock for the most part, cheap to expensive device, that doesn't matter, instant repair bill sticker shock.
so what is expensive or not is relative. It is all a niche, you get what you pay for and what to fool around with. Me, I can't see where people want to drop a thousand bucks on some big screen TV, but they do, or a video game system or some ridiculous toy like a jetski.
Expensive is just relative to the wallet and interest and what hassle you want to remove or what you want to happen with that money.
A *lot* of people out there are plain jane sick and tired of small engine devices that will not start or run reliably, no matter how much they spend on them. Electric motors are light years more reliable and maintenance free compared to gas devices, but that cord limitation is a serious one once you have to go outside and move more than a hundred feet from a socket. real serious..that's why battery stuff is getting so popular, and why battery drills were such a hit with workers who needed them. I certainly remember the bad old days of trying to climb around a structure and drag a freeking cord with me to run a drill and saw..ta heck with that noise, once battery drills hit I jumped on that tech. With both feet. Eliminating that stupid cord was worth the extra piddlyazz twenty cents a *day* it cost me over a corded drill.
The saws will catch up, along with the edgers and trimmers and mowers and you name it, we are just now hitting the "pretty decent" levels with battery powered tools.
And all these big companies know this, that is why they are all starting to put them out, and I am glad to see a tophandle version now available, and another name brand company start to offer battery sqws. More choices/more competition, the faster the tech will get better/faster/cheaper.. I know right now this second I would love to have a full range of good qulity battery devices, just for the Gf here around the house. She likes doing that sort of stuff, the little yard work stuff (I do all the mass quantities, but she likes the "trim" work) but she has the debble of a time yank starting things, and it doesn't matter which things, all of them, no matter how well they start for *me*.
You should have seen her face light up when she first tried the battery saw...
I am hoping eventually Oregon will have a whole range of devices that run from the same big battery.
