Montgomery Ward 3.6ci chainsaw

[cdahl383]

Picked up this nice old Montgomery wards chainsaw yesterday. From what I can tell it looks like a rebranded Remington PL4. I believe it’s 59cc and it has a 17” bar on it.

Pulled the muffler at the guys house just to make sure it was alright. Piston and cylinder looked good. Got it home and checked the vitals. Has spark and about 120-125psi compression. Should run with a carb rebuild. Fuel tank looks clean. Fuel lines and filter look alright too.

Cleaned it up good and ordered a carb kit for it (tillotson hs82a carb). Hope to get it running soon. Will need a chain too if I decide to cut with it.

 

[heimannm]

That is a fine looking saw. You may be surprised how well it cuts with a good chain, but the noise & vibrations will limit the hours you want to use it.

Mark

 

[cdahl383]

That is a fine looking saw. You may be surprised how well it cuts with a good chain, but the noise & vibrations will limit the hours you want to use it.

Mark

Yeah it cleaned up pretty good. It looked like a decent saw when I checked the ad out.

I talked to the guy for a bit when I was checking it out and he said his brother got it from an estate clean out he did. Apparently this older guy passed away and so they were cleaning everything out of the garage/basement, etc. He was going to take everything to the scrap yard. This guy told his brother, no way, that saw looks good still, don't toss it! So he grabbed it and set it aside. Makes you wonder how many good saws get thrown away to the scrap yard when all they may have needed was a cleaning, carb kit, fuel lines, etc.

It'll definitely need a chain if I end up cutting with it. The chain that's on there is all done. No way it can be sharpened again. I might just toss a chain on there just so it's complete and able to cut if needed.

Hoping the carb kit arrives in a few days. Should be able to work on it this weekend and hopefully get it fired up!

 

[pioneerguy600]

Cleaning the carbon out of the exhaust port and likely off the top of the piston may prevent some carbon scoring of the piston and cylinder.

 

[cdahl383]

Cleaning the carbon out of the exhaust port and likely off the top of the piston may prevent some carbon scoring of the piston and cylinder.

What’s the easiest way to do that? Not looking to disassemble this saw unless I have to.

Got new fuel lines today. Carb kit showed up too. Hoping to get it running later today.

 

[cdahl383]

Got the old saw running today! Cleaned and rebuilt the carb. Installed new fuel lines and fuel filter. Already had a good plug in it.

Didn't want to stay running at first. Would run for a bit, then crap out. Kept doing that, so I tore the carb down again and cleaned it all out again and blew all passages out with compressed air. Must have had something lodged in there somewhere. Put it all back together and now it runs fine.

Did a pressure/vacuum test too just to confirm everything was good. Held 7psi pressure and 14hg vacuum. Very minor leak down, not concerned about that.

Now it just needs a new chain and it's ready to cut! Current chain has no meat left on it, it's beyond sharpening. Will have to grab a new chain this weekend from the hardware store.

Only other issue I see is it has a small bar oil leak coming from this little plug looking thing above the fill cap. I'm not sure what that is, maybe some sort of vent? Whatever it is, it leaks a little bit. I'll have to look into that one day, but for now I'm just glad it's running and functional again.

This poor saw was heading to the scrap yard! Glad the previous owner rescued it and I was able to get it running again! Another one saved!