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Chainsaw ignition coil

Started by schnur7, April 19, 2016, 11:54:30 PM

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schnur7

Hey Guys,

Brand new to the forum and excited to get involved as I love anything involved with wood.  Just made my first stool out of a fir round using my chainsaw today. Pretty rough, but very cool how you can take a hunk of wood and turn it into a useful item with just a chainsaw  8) I was like a kid playing with a new toy.  Good thing I had two chainsaws because my newer more powerful Dolmar 5105 crapped out and wouldn't start. My 35cc Mccullough that my wife bought me years ago was able to finish the job.  I had the same problem with the Dolmar about a month ago and had a guy fix it by replacing the ignition coil.  It feels exactly the same as before and I'm sure it's not getting spark.  Any idea why after using the saw for the first time since getting it fixed the ignition coil would go out again? (at least that's my guess)  I don't know much about chainsaw maintenance but figured I'd better learn to do my own as I expand on my chainsaw hobby.  I bought the coil on line from repairclinic.com and had this local small engine repair guy install it for me.

sawguy21

Do you have the correct coil for your saw? There were a number of upgrades to early production 5105's.
old age and treachery will always overcome youth and enthusiasm

dougand3

Like sawguy says - 3 coils for that saw...red, grey and black. Here's the IPL:
http://download.dolmar.com/manuals/17761.pdf
Husky: 372xt, 272xp, 61, 55 (x3)...Poulan: 315, 4218 (x3), 2375, 2150, 2055, 2000 (x3)...Stihl 011AVT...Homelite XL...Saws come in broken, get fixed or parted, find new homes

Jiles

Some Makita/Dolmar are required to use an "R" spark plug. Coil can be damaged if regular plug is used.
Pull sparkplug, ground plug to metal case, pull motor over and check for spark.
Satisfy needs before desires

schnur7

Thanks for the replies.  I'm sure repairclinic.com has the right parts and wouldn't screw up....

I'll have to double check now.  Now I'm wishing I had bought the Husky instead of the DOLMAR.  No DOLMAR dealer nearby anymore.

So you're thinking an incorrect coil could work for a short time and then go bad?

sawguy21

Is it the same color as the one you replaced? If not the flywheel has to be changed to match. IIRC the red one has the rev limiter, the grey one does not. The black one may have been upgraded to the grey.
old age and treachery will always overcome youth and enthusiasm

joe_indi

Try it with the old coil with the switch wire(s) disconnected at the coil.
I need not be a coil issue. It could be a switch issue or a wire earthing on the body.
Joe

schnur7

So low and behold I was in my shop this afternoon and looked at that *DanG chainsaw and decided to see if it would fire up.  Sure enough - a few pulls and it started right up.  So now I don't know what the heck is going on.  Maybe it got too hot and then decided it didn't want to start back up.  I was having a heck of a time getting through the center of the log - is there harder wood at the center of a log?  This was a green doug fir that was just cut down.  Plus I was ripping through it more than cross cutting. 

The saw never cut out on me.  I turned it off after I was working it pretty hard cutting a big wedge out of the center and then it wouldn't start back up.  Felt like it wasn't getting spark because it didn't even make any attempt to turn over.

sharkey

How close are you to the base of the stump in that log you cant get through the center of?  Ive seen rocks 2.5 feet up in old pine stumps.  Ended up burning the stumps to get rid of them after they were dug out of the ground.  I found a bunch of sandstone rocks in the ashes...easily over a dozen.   

schnur7

It was a fairly small in diameter compared to the rest of the tree, so I'm sure it was from a section pretty high up in the tree.  Definitely just clear wood.  I had just sharpened the chain - and even though I'm probably not experienced enough to sharpen as well as others I'm pretty sure that wasn't the issue because when I was cutting more toward the outer part of the piece, it was throwing out decent size chunks of wood - definitely not sawdust.  Maybe I can post a video I took and people can tell what the heck I was doing wrong. It was definitely throwing out smoke at times when i was cutting so something wasn't right. Not sure if you can do videos on this site though.

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