Sorry to hear about your saw, but I doubt Stihl made the coil.

In your case the lack of quality may be with your dealer. Was the saw bought from a legit dealer and was it registered for warranty when it was bought? If registered you don't even need your sales slip from the purchase. The ignition system has a 5 year warranty on parts. You should have only been charged for labor.

If you didn't ask for warranty the dealer may not know how old the saw is. Most people will bring up the subject and ask. Your dealer can go to the dealer info web site and look up the purchase date if it was registered and you no longer have the sales slip. In our shop, any equipment bought from us and if the owners name match's the sales record, when the work order is entered in our computer the purchase date is automatically put on the print out. You may not have bought from this dealer or he may not be on the same computer program so you need to go back to him and ask him to check Stihl's registration records to verify. If you are under the 5 year coil warranty you should get a refund on what you paid for the new coil.

I have two Stihls: a trimmer FS55 and a Chainsaw MS192.

Both of them are rather disappointing as far as the engine. no complaints about their functionality (trimming and sawing), but when I go to get them started I never have this "warm fuzzy feeling" that they're going to start trouble-free.

They had to replace (luckily it was under warranty) the carb on the trimmer, a couple of years later after struggling with the trimmer again, I had to find on my own that the fuel intake line disintegrated and had to be replaced with a new one made of improved material. The chainsaw also is a gas guzzler.

I pretty much took these small annoyances as a "given," dealing with small-engine devices. But then I used my in-laws equivalent Echo chainsaw. Pleasure to start and operate.

Bottom line: My next tool is going to be Echo, not Stihl.

Cheers,
Zevi.

Thanks for the heads up Nevada Walrus. I purchased the chain saw from a certified rep. The repair work was done by a certified rep, but not the same dealer. I was told the coil was warranted for 1 year. I will see if Stihl has a support line or link and see if I can get an answer to the warranty.

Sure enough, I called and the coil has a 5 year warranty. Also, let me correct myself, the model is 310. Why the dealer didn't know is hard to understand. When I got the quote, I specifically asked. Anyways, I'm glad I vented on this forum and thanks to Nevada Walrus.

Great. There is a wealth of knowledge on this forum just waiting to be shared.

Often the person working the counter isn't the best person to know what warranty applies or when there are exceptions to the standard warranty.

When ever I get a machine benched, regardless of brand or model as long as its one we do warranty for, if there is a potential warranty problem and no purchase date on the work order I'll have my manager do the manufacture checks for purchase date. In fact had one last week, a Stihl TS-400 cut off saw. Engine destroyed due to a muffler problem. Looked to be out of warranty judging by condition but the known muffler problem had me feeling Stihl owed some consideration. But alas, the thing had never been registered so there was nothing I could do. Don't know if the unit was stolen or if someone just failed to take care of registering it. Since Stihl dealers handle the registration I hope the guy stole the thing and it wasn't a dealer screw up.