Cylinder swap on a 440

[teacherman]

To the mods: I posted this in the Stihl section without reading the "Read this first" part, and I tried to delete it but couldn't figure out how to do it. Please forgive me, I won't do that again.


Howdy folks. Living it up here in Virginia. Starting to climb trees again.
I am looking at swapping in a slant fin cylinder on my MS440. I've been looking at both the Mahle and the Kolbenschmidt (KS), and the KS ones look like they will move a lot more mixture through the ports than the Mahle ones. Has anyone compared the Mahle slant fins with the later decomp cylinders? This is a late 440 with not much use. It is a nice strong saw, and I'm thinking of spending a bit for a 10 mm Mahle cylinder to make it more so. Has anyone looked at the insides of the two side by side, or better yet, taken pictures of them? If it's not much change, I probably won't bother. I found an early KS jug for my late 064, which might make it rival a 500i.... and I could be happy with that instead.

 

[BonScott46]

KS cylinders usually run a bit better, higher compression and larger ports like you said. I have a KS on my 064 and it runs very well. I ran it for a while with a sub .020 squish and it was noticeably stronger but extremely hard to start.

 

[SOS Ridgerider]

To the mods: I posted this in the Stihl section without reading the "Read this first" part, and I tried to delete it but couldn't figure out how to do it. Please forgive me, I won't do that again.


Howdy folks. Living it up here in Virginia. Starting to climb trees again.
I am looking at swapping in a slant fin cylinder on my MS440. I've been looking at both the Mahle and the Kolbenschmidt (KS), and the KS ones look like they will move a lot more mixture through the ports than the Mahle ones. Has anyone compared the Mahle slant fins with the later decomp cylinders? This is a late 440 with not much use. It is a nice strong saw, and I'm thinking of spending a bit for a 10 mm Mahle cylinder to make it more so. Has anyone looked at the insides of the two side by side, or better yet, taken pictures of them? If it's not much change, I probably won't bother. I found an early KS jug for my late 064, which might make it rival a 500i.... and I could be happy with that instead.

Moved it to the general chainsaw page for you. Should see more traffic there.

 

[2000ssm6]

For what you would have in a nice slant fin p&c, be halfway towards a port job. Spend the extra money and have it ported, I’d have the crank seals replaced while it was there also.

 

[Ketchup]

For what you would have in a nice slant fin p&c, be halfway towards a port job. Spend the extra money and have it ported, I’d have the crank seals replaced while it was there also.

Exactly this. Replace the lines and carb diaphragms too if they’re original.

 

[teacherman]

For what you would have in a nice slant fin p&c, be halfway towards a port job. Spend the extra money and have it ported, I’d have the crank seals replaced while it was there also.

That's a good point. About how much would a work saw porting job cost? Just ballpark. I'm not trying to be chintzy, I really have no idea. It's a late 440 with about two or three tanks through it.

Shoot. I'll ask Randy myself.

 

[2000ssm6]

$300-$400, Randy would be a good one. Several others here I’d trust also.

 

[teacherman]

The NOS Mahle slant fin cylinder is listed for that price. I thought porting would be more than that. Thanks.

 

[Funky sawman]

And get a Zama c3 carb off that slant fin vintage 044, they seem to flow more fuel in the mid range giving it lots of torque. I have my 440 set up with a mahle slant fin and Zama c3 with a straight shot muffler