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Help! Husqvarna 350 chainsaw won't start

18 years ago

Hi all! My dad has a husqvarna 350 chainsaw that won't start. He has only had the saw for a little over a year. He accidently ran regular gas through it just for half a tank. When it died, he realized what he had done. He mixed some fuel for it and put in it. It was hard to get started back, but he finally did get it started. He said, it ran like a new saw for about 30 minutes and then died. He tried for days to get it restarted and he finally did. Same thing happened, it ran like new one for a little while and died again. It has done this about 3 times. Now, it will not start back. Any helped would be greatly appreciated!!!

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Comments (4)

karlp
18 years ago
Pop off the muffler and look at the piston through the exhaust port. If the piston looks okay, it could be bearings or just the ring. Pull those apart. If the piston looks scored, then pull the piston and look at the cylinder. If the cylinder looks okay, get a new piston. If there is much scoring in the cylinder, find a parts saw that had a tree fall on it and swap the parts to make one running saw.
hawk25
Original Author
18 years ago
Ok, I'll check that. He had talked to a couple of shops around here and they told him it might be the coil. Do you think it could be? If the piston, bearing, or rings were bad, would the saw still start and run for about 30 min.?
Thanks!
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"put some gas dircectly into the cylinder" IMO this is very hard to get the right amount? usually too much will wet the plug and it won't fire due to the overriched condition unless you use and eye dropper IMO. You best option when priming IMO would be to use carb. cleaner down the spark plug hole as suggested. pull the rope several times to wash out excess. spray, clean, and check gap of the plug. Plug the spark plug back in lay it on the head and pull the rope and look for the pretty blue spark if you haven't already? Now one or two second blast down the spark plug hole install the plug and try to start it. Should pop or rev up off the carb. cleaner if not I would check the compression release especially if the rope is easier or easier than normal during starting. I would do this couple of times before I gave up and went into the carb. I don't like that cheap on and off switch on my husky (345) easy to have it off when you think it's on. Agree key is don't let the saw set all spring and summer expecting it to start in the fall when you need it. something somewhere is clogging the fine passages in the carb. or the needle is stuck open flooding the saw (should be seen with wet spark plug and wettness out the muffler sometimes. Even pulling the mixture screws and spraying pressurized carb. cleaner through them may not unplug it, dissassembly maybe in order to get to the idle curcuits and only welch plug will get to the idle, mid, and full jets. Usually above methods works though
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hawk25
Original Author
18 years ago
I pulled the muffler off and looked at the piston. It looked fine to me. I also took the plug out and put my finger over the hole and cranked on the saw. It felt like good compression to me. I also checked the spark by grounding the plug and cranking on the saw. I could see spark but I not sure whether or not it was good spark though. The spark plug has been replaced. I put fresh fuel mix in it. It still will not crank. My dad said the times the he got it to crank was by taking the plug out and spraying wd40 in the hole. That would help it start and it would run for about 30 minutes and cut great and then it would just die.
randalicious
15 years ago
The oil in the bore before cranking is to get around a low compression ratio problem. It probably means your ring is shot. Rings are cheap, but probably your piston is either scored or about to be scored.

I've received conflicting opinions on the 350 piston problem. Mine keeps scoring the piston.

One source says that the cylinder bore is chromed, and is harder than the piston, so any irregularities on the bore is melted material deposited by the piston. He said that it could be smoothed out by sandpaper and made like new. He also said that the piston/bore is so tough that the 1:50 oil:gas mix is unnecessary, that it would run just fine on pure gas. He must be selling a lot of piston kits.

The other source says that the pre-45mm bores are bound to fail, and that it is foolish to try to keep fixing it.

I put 2 new pistons and rings in mine, and it ran fine for a few hours, but eventually quit and won't restart. Look for mine in parts on eBay.

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