Skilshop 1712 (Frontier-style) questions

[mexicanyella]

I picked up a Skilshop (Skil) model 1712 saw on Craigslist, because it was tiny and cute and I thought my wife might be able to use it once I got it running. Compression seemed good and priming the carb with 32:1 premix would get it to run for a few seconds at a time but it wasn't running beyond that, so it looked like carb kit and fuel lines time.

Despite deciding that, I tried priming it one more time and it fired briefly and locked up solid. No sign of scoring on the piston when I look in the exhaust port, and when I tip it this way and that something small and metallic is jingling around inside. Big end roller? Piston pin circlip? Piece of piston ring or skirt?

I'd like to find out, but (here's my actual question) how do you remove the clutch? Unlike the clutches on the plastic Poulans I'm used to, this one has a flat metal face covering the shoes, with two tiny round holes and two tiny rectangular holes. Is there a special tool or technique for this?

I tried my pneumatic hammer with a blunted chisel tool, on a soft power setting, in one of the rectangular holes in hopes it wouls spin right off, and instead it rotated the crank 10 or 15 degrees, probably grinding the hell out of whatever is wrong. Don't want to trash it any more than I already have...ideas?

 

[Rx7man]

I don't know how to get that clutch off, but have you looked on the flywheel side and made sure everything is OK there?

Which direction were you going to get the clutch off? they're probably left hand thread

 

[mexicanyella]

I don't see anything wrong on the flywheel side...the recoil cover is off, and the coil is not touching the flywheel rim. Something is adrift and tinkling around audibly inside there, and I'm guessing whatever it is has jammed against the piston in a transfer port, or something.

The clutch has an arrow and the word "off," and that's what I went by.

 

[jsmith40004]

These saws have retainers that hold the rod bearing rollers in place. They have a tendacy to break and let the rollers go everywhere. I'd say that's what happened.

Undo the four bolts holding the fuel tankand oil tank. The motor will split there and you don't have to remove clutch to see the carnage

James

 

[mexicanyella]

Thank you. I will try that and if the crank seems salvageable I guess I can clamp it in a padded vise to get the clutch off later.

 

[mexicanyella]

I removed the flywheel and ignition, carb, etc. and saw one stray big end bearing roller in the intake port, against the piston. Split the crankcase halves and found nine more. Pulled the piston and rod out of the cylinder and found one more roller in the combustion chamber. So, 11 rollers. The only damage I can see is two tiny flaws in the cylinder chrome near the top of one transfer port. Piston looks fine. I'd probably say friggit and put it back together and run it, but what about these roller retainers? Didn't find anything else in there, and if the rollers got loose once as it is, they could do it again...

What do the retainers look like?

 

[jsmith40004]

A young c-clip. Held together by a pin that goes through the rod.

There was an updated version Good luck finding them. Bought mine 10-15 years ago and they were nla then. Dealer just had some nos on shelf


James

 

[jsmith40004]

Is your saw electronic ignition or points? If electronic I have a good crank/rod assembly I'll have to look

James

 

[mexicanyella]

This saw has points, with the points cam being ground directly into the crank right behind the flywheel taper. I am looking into picking up a similar Partner-branded saw from local Craigslist--either for parts, or to fix, in which case I'd use the Skil for parts--and this Partner might be electronic. But I haven't seen it in person yet and don't know its condition. I can tell it has a chainbrake from the ad photo, which this Skilshop version I own does not have.

If you could take a photo of your crank's rod journal area, possibly showing me the configuration of the retainer you mentioned, I'd greatly appreciate it. I don't see a groove for a snap ring or anything I can visualize as a retainer on this one, or on the IPLs I've looked at. It looks like a bunch of fat little crowded rollers; I guess you pack them into a layer of grease on the rod journal and then carefully snake that rod over the non-counterweight side of the crank and onto the rollers, trying not to knock any of them loose...? I don't see any obvious damage in this area that would have let one escape, and it makes me wonder if someone had it apart and put it back together without realizing one had escaped during assembly. If that's the case, it must not have run after assembly and I caused WWIII in there trying to start it.

Or maybe I'm just missing a detail or two of how the retainer you mentioned works, and whatever it was came apart and blew on through. Don't see any evidence of shrapnel in the muffler screen, though, or peen marks on the piston crown or combustion chamber like you get when a two-stroke bounces a piece of piston ring around before blowing it out.

Weird as this problem seems to me, I have to say this seems like a very clever, simple and resourceful design, and it was easy to disassemble. I hope I get a chance to run the thing and see how well it actually works...some day.

 

[mexicanyella]

I will try and look at some more IPLs, maybe of other rebranded variants, and see if I spot this wire retainer device on them.

It appears that the small end "eye" of the copper-colored stamped connecting rod run directly on the piston pin, where it has discernable up-and-down play...maybe several thousandths? I wonder if that's normal on these or if that means the rod/pin fit is in fact sloppy...or if I egg-shaped the small end hole when I locked it up and then attempted to air-hammer the clutch off.

 

[mexicanyella]

I found an IPL of a Partner variant that showed two E-clip-looking things that appeared to go on the rod journal on either side of the rod, and a pin of some sort that went through a hole in the rod and retained the clips on the rod journal. So now I see.

The Skilshop 1712 rod does not have this hole, though, and some of the IPLs I've looked at either show the crank and rod as an assembly, without much detail, or in the case of the Pioneer P10, the IPL image is very clear but shows the rod and the rollers separate from the crank, but no retainers and no apparent hole in the rod.

I think I'm going to grease it up, pack those rollers together, reassemble it and see what happens...

 

[Chris J.]

Good info in this thread! Thanks to all.

I have two, possibly three, of those saws, one with a CB, but haven't tinkered with any of them. Someone here sent me two NOS 12" bars (a long-time & active member, at the moment I can't recall his user name).

Unfortunately my stash of downloaded documents doesn't include any service manuals, just IPLs.

 

[mexicanyella]

If you decide those saws are not likely to be contenders in your fixing priority list, I would like to hear from you. They come up around here on CL every once in a great while, but it looks like I'll need to be pretty alert to amass a store of spare parts if I want to actually own/operate one.

 

[Chris J.]

If you decide those saws are not likely to be contenders in your fixing priority list, I would like to hear from you. They come up around here on CL every once in a great while, but it looks like I'll need to be pretty alert to amass a store of spare parts if I want to actually own/operate one.

TBH, most folks here consider them to be "meh" at best, made cheaply to achieve a low price point. Consider this--I asked the fellow AS member who sent the bars to give others first shot at them and said that one bar would be all I needed; he sent both because no one else asked for them! And there are old magazine ads showing the small Skil chainsaws as giveaways with certain purchases.

If you're wanting to put the effort & money into a small saw that you'll use frequently, the top-handle 38cc Poulan models are probably your best bang-for-the-buck. The rear-handle models might even be better for safety (there's a lot of debate over that issue), those are more common as re-badged Craftsman than as Poulan.

The only reason I have them is........I got my first one in a package deal (I considered it a freebie, sort of) bought the second one (cheap enough) because it had a CB. If I have a third one, I can't recall how I got it.

 

[jsmith40004]

You going to reuse the old rollers? Make sure they aren't messed up nor worn too short.

 

[mexicanyella]

I can't see any surface flaws in them, amazingly, but I guess I better hit up my neighbor (retired machinist) for some micrometer time. Any idea what the dimensions should be?

 

[mexicanyella]

I would like to try running one and see how finicky it is, and how well it runs. I just think they are kind of cool looking and cute. I used to have a red 2.3 ci Craftsman/Poulan and it seemed to be pretty solid, and I do see the later beige ones on CL a lot. I'll keep your advice in mind.

I see a lot of Homelite XL/Super 2 type saws on CL too. Never ran one of those before, and opinion here seems pretty sharply divided between "throw it hard at a hard surface" and "they're simple and work well for trimming."

I ran a Mac 1xx a little bit several years ago and didn't care for how it felt; noisy, finicky to start, lots of vibration, mysterious carb location, handles too close together for me, etc. I have a SP-40 on the "future project" shelf that looks like it might address the handle location and carb access issues, at least. But it's not shaped like a cute little bug the way the Skil/Frontier saws are. And it has that problematic impulse piston oiler too.

No one seems to favor throwing the magnesium small Poulans; I guess that's something.

 

[jsmith40004]

The little skil saws were designed as a throw away. That said they aren't bad. They vibrate and will leave your hands tingling.

They will hang with a ms200 if they are right. There are a few different cylinders with different timing numbers.

The rollers were still available through husqvarna five years ago for a model 35. That was the last time I was into one

James

 

[mexicanyella]

There's a Husqvarna dealer pretty close to me...I'll stop and ask about availability for model 35 parts. Thanks for the tip. My uncle is a Jonsereds guy and knows a dealer for those; maybe he could put me in touch after I do some research on which Jred model(s) were Frontier/Quadra.

I was checking out some small Oleo-Mac saws on Acres' site and thought I saw a few that looked like 80s-modern angular housings but which appeared to be configured in such a way that they might contain the Frontier/Quadra engine. Bore and stroke were a little different, but the carb housing appeared to be in the same slightly odd place. The 233 looked like my Skil but more angular, and the 234 looked like it had added some pretty elaborate top-mounted anti-vibe bushings too. That little engine really got around for awhile there.

So I found a Partner 1616, which does have electronic ignition, a chain brake, and the air-cooled chain brake cover and tail pipe doodad. This one has a 16" McCulloch bar on it and 3/8LP chain, on a spur sprocket. (The Skilshop has a 14", I think, with 1/4" chain and one of those sprockets where the teeth are made of folded metal). It too runs on a carb prime but not off the fuel tank yet. I hope I can sort the carb and lines out before I blow its rollers all over the place. This one has anti-vibe too...a rubber-covered front handle.

 

[Doyle E Wessler]

This saw has points, with the points cam being ground directly into the crank right behind the flywheel taper. I am looking into picking up a similar Partner-branded saw from local Craigslist--either for parts, or to fix, in which case I'd use the Skil for parts--and this Partner might be electronic. But I haven't seen it in person yet and don't know its condition. I can tell it has a chainbrake from the ad photo, which this Skilshop version I own does not have.

If you could take a photo of your crank's rod journal area, possibly showing me the configuration of the retainer you mentioned, I'd greatly appreciate it. I don't see a groove for a snap ring or anything I can visualize as a retainer on this one, or on the IPLs I've looked at. It looks like a bunch of fat little crowded rollers; I guess you pack them into a layer of grease on the rod journal and then carefully snake that rod over the non-counterweight side of the crank and onto the rollers, trying not to knock any of them loose...? I don't see any obvious damage in this area that would have let one escape, and it makes me wonder if someone had it apart and put it back together without realizing one had escaped during assembly. If that's the case, it must not have run after assembly and I caused WWIII in there trying to start it.

Or maybe I'm just missing a detail or two of how the retainer you mentioned works, and whatever it was came apart and blew on through. Don't see any evidence of shrapnel in the muffler screen, though, or peen marks on the piston crown or combustion chamber like you get when a two-stroke bounces a piece of piston ring around before blowing it out.

Weird as this problem seems to me, I have to say this seems like a very clever, simple and resourceful design, and it was easy to disassemble. I hope I get a chance to run the thing and see how well it actually works...some day.

I've recently acquired a model 1712.
It's been sitting for a while. 3. To 5 years i'm guessing. I cleaned out the fuel tank. Blew out all the c*** old sawdust and what not. Check for Spark put some fresh fuel in it It fired first Pull. That's as far as i've gotten with it so far