500i Battery Saw?

It's more comparable to a 150 or 194t than 201. It's good for pruning or limbing up a trees for removal. I feel like a thinner kerf chain would chisel wood quicker for the power it seems to have
Have you used the husqvarna 540ixp and if so how would you compare? Arbsession.com has the bar and sprocket stuff for converting stihls to the snake chain that comes on the 540ixp.
 
Have to admit it took me a minute, but figured it out before I tried googling it

Me too, those Arbsession guys nailed it. The hair on the back of my neck raised in the 10 seconds it took me to figure it out. I was half way through prepping my "that's bullsh*t 'cause lithium" speech when another guy's April fools recognition comment popped my balloon...
 
Have you used the husqvarna 540ixp and if so how would you compare? Arbsession.com has the bar and sprocket stuff for converting stihls to the snake chain that comes on the 540ixp.
If I wasn't so invested in stihls battery system with all other tools I would get that husky saw, as it seemed better to me when I used it than this particular stihl on side by comparison for cutting. I'm not really interested at this point in a conversion to that chain but thanks for putting it out there!
 
Me too, those Arbsession guys nailed it. The hair on the back of my neck raised in the 10 seconds it took me to figure it out. I was half way through prepping my "that's bullsh*t 'cause lithium" speech when another guy's April fools recognition comment popped my balloon...
I'd like to hear that speech colb I'm trying to learn more about lithium battery's
 
I'd like to hear that speech colb I'm trying to learn more about lithium battery's

Well, the sweet spot for the lithium saw market is the ms200t -> ms260 powerhead size.

If smaller, the batteries seem to weigh too much for the saw. That does not have to be the circumstance, but it kind of is in practice, for now... ...there are lots of potential and realized exceptions to this, so have at me boys.

Larger lithium motors have not arrived at market yet to cut big wood with a thick bar. Someone is hopefully designing and developing them this very second, but there's no ms440 or ms881 lithium equivalent that lots of people are using that has both the power to cut big wood and can cut for long enough on a single battery.

But in the tophandle and standard ground saw market, the lithium saws have "acceptable" weight, they have acceptable or even good power/torque (sometimes achieved in part through a narrow kerf bar). The Husqvarna 540i XP has even exceeded gas powerhead equivalent performance, so it is a matter of very short time before all lithium powerheads in this class routinely outperform their gas powerhead equivalents in every performance category.

By meeting or exceeding these baseline standards in comparison to gas powerheads, the lithium saws come into their own through their upsides - jobsite safety through eliminating noise, not having to pull start before starting a cut, simpler motors -> fewer repairs, no fume inhalation, instant chain speed, etc.

In a fair world, lithium saws would just need to achieve equity with gas saws through asymetrical fairness, not equity through equality. Lithium saws and gas saws are impossible to compare on basis of equality - they are so different. In the real world, gas came first, and for lithium power to unseat gas power it must show itself equal to or superior in the categories where gas saws are strongest. Only then do the very different strengths of lithium saws over gas saws receive their due consideration. That moment is happening in the tophandle and small ground saw market segment.

The "i" designation is a spoof on the ms 500i, implying that Stihl is making an injected four stroke gas tophandle. Bringing this tech to saws is an evolution and thus represents considerable product development investment. The gains of the 500i (my impression) are a better power to weight ratio for climbers, and broad landscaping powerhead emissions tier compliance for Stihl. To that latter point, while Stihl still made an ms880, they needed to offset those emissions by metaphorically "nerfing the weed whacker". Every emissions reduction in the larger powerhead segment means that they can increase emissions of their gas "weedwhacker", or perhaps a few weedwhackers. In that context, developing the 500i helped their lineup, as presumably did the redo of the ms880 into the ms881. With the ms880, there was less reason to make it an injected 4 stroke because it is so infrequently climbed with. By extension, the dumbest place to install an injected 4-stroke - even dumber than an ms880 makeover into an ms799i - is head-to-head with the lithium market segment sweet spot. It would be a dodo bird to the lithium club.

Discuss. :D
 
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I've been using the top handle makita 18v for a few weeks and I like it a lot. I did have the battery fall out while dangling through some thick brush. It's much lighter than the Husqvarna battery saw, great for pruning.

I have read though that battery tech is really not the answer to larger problems because there simply is not enough material to even come close to replacing the combustion engines we have now. Also the mining is very bad for the environment and many people are exploited to get this stuff to market.

We really need to consume less energy in general but I don't see a crosscut saw Renaissance anywhere on the horizon :ROFLMAO:
 
The problem with batteries has been and continues to be their energy density. 1 gallon of gas stores alot more energy for an equivalently scaled battery. Until batteries can store at least as much power as a gallon of gas, it will be a stretch to electrify many use cases (like big displacement saw heads). Same problem with EV vehicles - great for some uses, but terrible for others. Battery tech has not evolved much since the first electric vehicles in the 1920's and 30's, but it has gotten a lot better in last 10 years mainly due to the needs of smartphones.
 
I've been using the top handle makita 18v for a few weeks and I like it a lot. I did have the battery fall out while dangling through some thick brush. It's much lighter than the Husqvarna battery saw, great for pruning.

I have read though that battery tech is really not the answer to larger problems because there simply is not enough material to even come close to replacing the combustion engines we have now. Also the mining is very bad for the environment and many people are exploited to get this stuff to market.

We really need to consume less energy in general but I don't see a crosscut saw Renaissance anywhere on the horizon :ROFLMAO:

I feel like there are lots of battery technologies that could come to production alongside or as replacements to lithium.
 
Maybe we'll have a breakthru in a few years and you'll be able to stick a few AA sized cells into a 500i (battery edition lol) and cut for hours. It would be cool - and change the world! Not there yet, though.
 

A lot of ifs in this one, but supposedly this new study says there's enough rare earth metals to go around. I'm skeptical because I've read a lot to the contrary. But the end of the article says the same thing, really we just need to use less.


Here's a bit about the environmental impacts of lithium mining:

 
I feel like there are lots of battery technologies that could come to production alongside or as replacements to lithium.
Definitely, I was just reading about that. I may just be a crazy hippie but I still feel like using less is a great solution. I posted an article on here awhile back about batteries made part from lignin. Definitely a lot of possibilities!
 
I think there's lots of lithium out there. But much of it's in areas where the West is not viewed very highly if I remember correctly. Plus, I hear the stuff that's mined by the kids is better (that's a joke in case it didn't come across as one lol)
 
I heard, and they will probably deny it if asked, that someone may have searched for "200i" on Arbsession's website before realizing they'd been had lol. It definitely steps up the game...<cracks knuckles>
 
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The problem with batteries has been and continues to be their energy density. 1 gallon of gas stores alot more energy for an equivalently scaled battery. Until batteries can store at least as much power as a gallon of gas, it will be a stretch to electrify many use cases (like big displacement saw heads). Same problem with EV vehicles - great for some uses, but terrible for others. Battery tech has not evolved much since the first electric vehicles in the 1920's and 30's, but it has gotten a lot better in last 10 years mainly due to the needs of smartphones.
It's the cost as well and charge time, I do some forestry work I mostly use a 261 as it's light has good power and most of what we're cutting is sub 20" for me to run the battery equivalent of that saw for a day out there would cost me 3 grand per saw in batteriesand chargers plus the saw.
 

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