038 magnum mod

[buckkillr8]

I picked up a stihl 038 magnum, which I'm more of a husky man but not to get off the subject, I was wondering what kind of modifications I can do to get more power from the saw. I've read plenty on here about modifying the muffler. Could anybody tell me in detail how to go about doing this for an 038 magnum? Is there anything else that I could do myself for more power?

 

[treeclimber165]

Stihl quit selling those saws in the US rather than try to muffle them down to meet EPA specs. Other than cleaning and matching up the port openings, there probably isn't much to do muffler-wise.
The 038Magnum was a torquer, not a screamer. Run a full comp chisel chain on no larger than a 24" bar and you won't be able to stop it if it's running right. I ran a 27" on mine and took the depth rakers down to get more bite and STILL couldn't get it to bog very often.

I'd check with DozerDan, he's in your neck of the woods and does mods. He just doesn't talk about it as much as Dennis.

 

[buckkillr8]

Thanks, so in other words the 038 magnum's a pretty good saw just the way it is.

 

[treeclimber165]

Originally posted by buckkillr8
Thanks, so in other words the 038 magnum's a pretty good saw just the way it is.

Yeah, and Anna Cournikovia (or however you spell it) is a pretty good looking tennis player.

 

[buckkillr8]

dont know is she?

 

[dozerdan]

PP 038

Hi
I have two 038 magnums coming in this month for Power Porting.I will post the cutting times of before and after the modifications.
I just finished up a PP 372 today.Test cuts were all made in a 18" poplar log with 3/8 LP chain.Three cuts were made before and after the mods,here are the aveages of those cuts.
Stock 372 12.82 sec
PP 372 8.85 sec
Later
Dan

 

[deadtrees]

I have a new 038 mag that has less than a tank of gas through it. I opened up the muffler with some ideas from Ken Dunn. I opened it up to 1.5 times the area of the piston port and am using a screen. I did five before and five after cuts in a dry 10 x 13 oak log. It was only 4/10 of a second faster after the mods. Hardly what I expected. It is a little louder but not too bad. I have before and after pictures of the muffler if someone is interested. I was going to mod a muffler on one of my 028 super
saws but now I am not so sure. The 028 saws are 18 years old and may not have the restricted mufflers new saws have. I am interested in the gain realized from power porting. The Walkers dyno chart on the 038 did not show much gain.

 

[daveb]

038 mag

You are right about the walkerized chart. I don't know what happened but it lost torque throughout the entire range and only gained horsepower in a narrow band. Something must be wrong, but I don't know what. BTW I have a 038 mag and it has a dual port muffler stock, but I still drilled the out the baffle/support as much as I could and opened the front port up. I use a 24" full comp with rakers down a bit and what a torquer. It will just pull you right in if you're not up against the log.

 

[buckkillr8]

deadtrees

I'd like to see the pics.

 

[deadtrees]

I will post the muffler mod photos but it will take me a couple of days.

 

[deadtrees]

This is the inside of the stock muffler.

 

[deadtrees]

There were two stock outlets.

 

[deadtrees]

The outside.

 

[deadtrees]

I added the large oval slot and made 2 slots from 4 holes in the inner basket.

 

[treeclimber165]

Mine didn't have any inner basket. It was purchased new in '87 or so.

 

[deadtrees]

This port was made large enough to have total area 1.5 times the piston port area. The screen is 24 x 24 mesh stainless steel with 41% open area. I took the screen area into account and also the screened area of the 2 original outlets. The holes in the outer heat shield had plenty of area so I did not change them.
As I have stated, the saw was only .4 seconds faster through the same log after the mods. I tried some carb adjustment but it ran the best on the original settings.

 

[Gypo Logger]

Very nice pictures Deadtrees. I cut the top of the inner box completely out and opened the port in the face plate. I think the hard part is to get the optimum backpressure for each saw. I will see how it cuts. If I opened it to much I could close off the second port with a piece of thin stock to replace the screen.
John

 

[Gypo Logger]

Heres the saw. I traded a new 046 for this 2 year old 038 plus 500$ to Woodzy the Woodtick. I gave the 038 to Woodzy 2 years ago, brandnew for finding me some good timber.
It was in perfect shape except it needed a carb kit and sprocket and chain, plus TLC.

 

[Gypo Logger]

Here's Woodzy groovin on his new 046. I told him not to scratch it and to change the sprocket regularly and to blow out the airbox often. Its fine to clean the filter, but the air boxes on Stihls accumulate alot more sawdust then Huskys do, which ends up plugging the pump and metering side of the carb.
John

 

[Gypo Logger]

If you look at the first picture I posted of the muffler mod you can see that the chain break has been subjected to the heat of the stock port in the muffler. I think this has been caused by the higher temp the saw was running at and the small stock port, plus long cuts in the wood with dull chain. How's this for the sprocket that was on this saw?
John