The stihl boys can not stand this,what they don’t know is the original 7900 was even a little faster than the 7910 (epa).The 7900 has been out for at least 20 years plus and you could buy one for around $700.
I have that same model Makita, and it gets down. Yes the 500 is fast etc. but I bought the 7900 and a 261C for basically the cost of one 500. Makita is less money, more torque, pulls big bars and is a plain old carb. What’s not to like? Video was hilarious and informative, two of my favorite things combined! Haha
7910 is a great saw, but no other 80cc saw has the torque of a 500i lol, come on. It's a hair behind 90 cc saws. I've ran both and I could tell the difference, Dyno Joe Mods also confirmed it with actual numbers, is has about 10% more torque than 7910.
Great commentary on this one. I’m partial to Dolmar. The 500i is just shy of $1700 at my local dealer! Holy sh*t! My firewood pennys are getting saved for a 7910 that I’ll get ported…
That Dolkita is growing on me. At first I was turned off by the bulbous alien head that is the air filter cover. Purely aesthetics. Purely opinion. But after watching it kick ass, I think that thought was over taken by the thought of, "Damn that Dolkita has torque!" P.S. Loved the head to head match up of Soft hands Steve! Haha, Double wave to Mom! Good stuff Boedy!
That's the better air filter system, the regular one is more often on the 6400 and 7300 and newer variations, but it's an option on all of them. 6400,6401,6421,7300,7310,7900,7910, etc.
Boedy the regular 038 is 61 cc's (my dad has one), 038 Super is 66 or 67 and both Magnums (Magnum and MagnumII) are 72.2 cc's. The Poulan 245 is either 73, 73.7, or 74 cc's according to Mike Acre's website. There's 3 different sizes given under the 3 different 245 models shown on the website. Lol! The Echo CS-7310 is 73.5 cc's. I have over 30 McCulloch's, pushing 40 with the little cheap plastic ones and the better made older top handles, 5-49 two man saw and Super Pro 125, Partner made McCulloch Pro Mac 1000 and 3 of the Super Pro 81 (2) and Pro Mac 850 (1). I would still take my Pro Mac 55 (57 cc's) over the 455 Rancher any day of the week. I have a 54 cc Pro 10-10 Automatic with a 28" bar and Husqvarna X-Cut sp33g .325" chain on it. It's 103 drive links and I was able to rip with the grain on Black Walnut that was seasoned at least 2 to 3 years so problem. No they're not super fast, but they have the power to do it. Those old saws just don't have the rpm of the new saws.
Skip tooth helps out a ton! I have never purposefully sharpened a chain with soft wood in mind. Over 90% of my cutting is in red oak, so I sharpen for that.
Welcome to the channel! Of course I use the right chain setup. It's an awful lot of work to set this stuff up and then edit these videos like I do to fail in such a small detail as a chain. All of the 50cc class saws are running a .325 Stihl RS out of the box and the larger mid 50cc and up saws run an out of the box 3/8 Husqvarna C-83 X-Cut. Further into this video, I even explain that these two saws were running the exact same chain. 500i went first, then the Makita.
Try cutting some dried 8inch water vines. I have a overgrown mess in the back of the property and I watched my chain spark a d my axe bounce. Glad not to be in Australia cleaning up the backyard
You are right about us out west.. Trees are soft. Hardest we have in Alberta is tamarack larch, id like to try harder wood, but just not in the cards, but youtube has made people Think old saws are the cats ass, they are fun but my crap Chinese 55cc saws will outrun my 10-10s all day
I run both of these saws. Honestly I prefere the Dolmar to the Stihl. It only matches in my brain. Could the Dolmar realy be the better saw looking at all the hipe about the 500i? In the real world it is!😊
@@novicelumberjack math comes out to about 15.8". It definitely seems about right. But the cant is solid wood with no bark. And the outer layers of sapwood are softer and less dense. Not sure exactly how much so it would be but when it comes to cutting speed, but a cant made up of nearly zero at least outer sap wood would be harder and denser overall than a 16" round stripped of bark. Even if it were out of the further end of the same log.
@@novicelumberjack I do think that this is about as fair a test as it can be. No matter what, theirs always variables with saws and wood. Given daily temperatures, pressures, and tuning will make saws cut in wide variations even if they are auto-tuning (obviously more so if not). An imperfect tune on a 70cc saw will make it cut right with or a bit behind a well tuned or auto-tuning 60cc saw. Just for example. Then even wood cut from the same tree will vary widely in density and grain direction. So cutting rounds where there will inevitably be wide variation in size, shape, grain, and hidden knots limits your potential for repeatable results. However, removing sapwood, and cutting cants like this eliminates as many variables as you can in the wood side. Sure, there will be a knot or two here and there and a little variation in grain, but long cants are cut out of straighter sections of log with less variation to begin with. And you can use the same semi-dry cants for longer periods of time and test a vast array of saws using the same pattern of cant and your results are repeatable to a far higher degree. A 14" cant from 3 years ago out of oak from even just your general region will be very similar in how it cuts to one cut the same way this week there, and your tests should be very close to repeating. That's all you really can ask for for chainsaw comparisons. Redbull661 I believe is his channel name tests saws using stacks of oak railroad ties for this same reason. And as you say yourself, just because a saw might cut a hair faster in the cants doesn't necessarily make it a superior saw to one that may just be better to live with. One that tunes better, or is lighter, or when it comes to saws about the 60cc class on up, I'd like to see you add a 3rd piece of cant and run a 21"x14" longer bar test to test the differences of how a saw that has more bottom might be as fast or faster than a zippy saw that possibly beat it in the smaller wood. You get into so rather large oak where you cut, so this is a viable real world type test. No the 14" depth wouldn't emulate a full size 21" test but cutting 21" worth of heartwood for 14" of depth would be enough to show the difference I'd think.
@@novicelumberjack I'm an Easy Coast hardwood guy too. While I've helped remove some large willows, cedars, and poplars, with the odd big pine, the vast majority of my cutting experience is on hardwoods from 3"-33" just to throw a number at it. Sure, we have some 4'+ silver maples and plenty of 3' hard maple, beech, yellow birch, and cherry around but for general firewood work, handling wood much above 2' in diameter is not fun in any way. Going from 24-28" willow to blocking even 16" hardwood is a shocking difference in how hard it works a saw. Of course running a chain set up for softwood with lower rakers will be almost unserviceable in hardwood unless you are up in the 90+cc range. And then it will just be unenjoyable. Currently my 394xp is filed a bit too aggressive for dry hardwood. I blocked some dead dry hardwood the other day and anything more than self-feeding will pretty much cut it out. I couldn't use the dogs at all. To be fair, I was only using it because it needed to be run. The largest blocks were only about 18". And filed as such, it was a damn lightsaber if you did your part and got the pressure right. But in wood that size, my muffler modded, very broken in, echo 590 is really what I should have been running as far as what makes sense for it. It's a really good firewood saw. Sure, the hotter saws are probably more fun to run, which is why I ran a tank and a half through a dual port muffler modded 8-pin 394 (8-pin is also probably a reason it wouldn't pull the overly aggressive chain with pressure) but sometimes fun wins out. As far as pure production goes, the echo just smoothly cuts really well. It is surprisingly quick with a well sharpened chain because it doesn't scream at you and just happily chugs along whether it's in 8" or 18" wood. Really forgiving and easy to run power delivery.
Anyone who's ever run a Makita or dolmar knew this way before but watched to confirm by how much lol Stihl is a good saw but I have had better results from the makitas
Actually, Randy already corrected me. The Makita only has the screen removed, not even a real muffler mod. But...one could also say, just put fuel injection on the Makita, then it would be fair.
@@lumberjacksons4468 well the saw in this video will be getting ported by me for sure. So we'll get to see what I can do with them. I'm looking forward to it!
If I saw someone limbing with a 500i, I'd wonder weather they were on drugs, or if they were born dumb. Seriously. These big oaks have MASSIVE crowns. If you are climbing with a 500i, that's crazy. If it is already on the ground and you limb out the crown with a 500i, you'll die of exhaustion. Lots of lifting the saw overhead to reach the crazy big branches. The smaller saws are for limbing. Big tall straight pines, firs, and birch wouldn't be so bad, but still...why would anyone want to use an 80cc saw for cutting tiny little branches? Just...seems silly to me. Little wood = little saw Big wood = big saw
I personally know 2 tree guys that run ms 462’s and 500i’s in the tree. They don’t like to haul sever saws up, when chunking trees up they start with a 201t and work as far as the 16” 201 will cut then they’ll go to the 500i or 462.
To bad the 500i didn't also have a muffler mod like the Dolmar. I've muffler modded many modern saws and it always makes a difference, some significant. And no, I'm not a Stihl fan boy or a 500i owner, nor will I be as I have no need for a saw that large. The fact is I own many saws of many brands including Dolmar, Dolmar Makitas and Makita made by Makita plus Stihl, poulan, Echo, Homelite ect. I like saws that perform as I need them to regardless of color or label.
I haven't looked inside the 500i muffler, but I bet it wouldn't make much of a difference. I've been noticing a trend with the new saws...their fuel delivery is so good, they aren't trying so hard to create a converter out of their mufflers. Therefore, the mufflers are just an open can. My 592xp is like that. The Domar on the other hand, relied heavily on a catalytic type muffler to meet emissions standards. In this scenario, it probably put the two saws on even footing rather than giving one an advantage.
The 500i has a huge lop sided deflector that directs the exhaust to the side of the can furthest away from the outlet on the other side and the outlet is fairly small on the can so yes a 500i gains a fair amount.
Dolmar/Makita are/were the best saws made!!! I already knew who was gunna win this one!!!
The stihl boys can not stand this,what they don’t know is the original 7900 was even a little faster than the 7910 (epa).The 7900 has been out for at least 20 years plus and you could buy one for around $700.
Your commentary makes me chuckle every time!
You're right about the oak, but Doug fir is way harder than pine or cedar. Unless it's one of those pines That's full of freaking knots. Great video!
Dolmar 7910 this is a Legend
I have that same model Makita, and it gets down. Yes the 500 is fast etc. but I bought the 7900 and a 261C for basically the cost of one 500. Makita is less money, more torque, pulls big bars and is a plain old carb. What’s not to like? Video was hilarious and informative, two of my favorite things combined! Haha
Thanks man!
7910 is a great saw, but no other 80cc saw has the torque of a 500i lol, come on. It's a hair behind 90 cc saws. I've ran both and I could tell the difference, Dyno Joe Mods also confirmed it with actual numbers, is has about 10% more torque than 7910.
@@em4703 gross power and torque dont mean anything you want a broad torque and power curve and thats what the Makita has
Great commentary on this one. I’m partial to Dolmar. The 500i is just shy of $1700 at my local dealer! Holy sh*t!
My firewood pennys are getting saved for a 7910 that I’ll get ported…
You should do a wack-off of sorts using the same saw but 2 different types of wood. Hard vs soft , a visual to get your point across
I agree.
This is a fantastic idea!
Now when he says muffler mod guys. It’s still stock exhaust inlet and exit only thing removed is the internal baffle.
The 7910 was kind of a well kept secret ☺️
Y'all should have told more people...maybe they'd still be around!
they still are just branded Makita now.@@novicelumberjack
@@2001wjMakita stoped making them last year
That Dolkita is growing on me. At first I was turned off by the bulbous alien head that is the air filter cover. Purely aesthetics. Purely opinion. But after watching it kick ass, I think that thought was over taken by the thought of, "Damn that Dolkita has torque!" P.S. Loved the head to head match up of Soft hands Steve! Haha, Double wave to Mom! Good stuff Boedy!
That's the better air filter system, the regular one is more often on the 6400 and 7300 and newer variations, but it's an option on all of them. 6400,6401,6421,7300,7310,7900,7910, etc.
@@johnlincicum6390 Thanks John. Like I said, it was purely just an observational opinion. But, I am actually starting to like it.
Boedy the regular 038 is 61 cc's (my dad has one), 038 Super is 66 or 67 and both Magnums (Magnum and MagnumII) are 72.2 cc's. The Poulan 245 is either 73, 73.7, or 74 cc's according to Mike Acre's website. There's 3 different sizes given under the 3 different 245 models shown on the website. Lol! The Echo CS-7310 is 73.5 cc's. I have over 30 McCulloch's, pushing 40 with the little cheap plastic ones and the better made older top handles, 5-49 two man saw and Super Pro 125, Partner made McCulloch Pro Mac 1000 and 3 of the Super Pro 81 (2) and Pro Mac 850 (1). I would still take my Pro Mac 55 (57 cc's) over the 455 Rancher any day of the week. I have a 54 cc Pro 10-10 Automatic with a 28" bar and Husqvarna X-Cut sp33g .325" chain on it. It's 103 drive links and I was able to rip with the grain on Black Walnut that was seasoned at least 2 to 3 years so problem. No they're not super fast, but they have the power to do it. Those old saws just don't have the rpm of the new saws.
The trick to long bars on smaller saws is to run skip or semi skip ground on 25 degrees in soft wood.
Skip tooth helps out a ton! I have never purposefully sharpened a chain with soft wood in mind. Over 90% of my cutting is in red oak, so I sharpen for that.
Pretty sure that I heard ,possibly from Kensi, that the 7910 has been discontinued. They are limiting their product lines to sub 70cc saws.
No more new 2 strokes from Makita/Dolmar from this year.
...only battery from now on 🥺🥺🥺
I would think that for it to be a really fair comparison the Stihl would need to have a muffler mod as well. Just sayin
Did you use the same chain on both? If not, it's not a fair race.
Welcome to the channel! Of course I use the right chain setup. It's an awful lot of work to set this stuff up and then edit these videos like I do to fail in such a small detail as a chain. All of the 50cc class saws are running a .325 Stihl RS out of the box and the larger mid 50cc and up saws run an out of the box 3/8 Husqvarna C-83 X-Cut. Further into this video, I even explain that these two saws were running the exact same chain. 500i went first, then the Makita.
I enjoyed this one👍🏻
Try cutting some dried 8inch water vines. I have a overgrown mess in the back of the property and I watched my chain spark a d my axe bounce. Glad not to be in Australia cleaning up the backyard
Awsome
You are right about us out west.. Trees are soft. Hardest we have in Alberta is tamarack larch, id like to try harder wood, but just not in the cards, but youtube has made people Think old saws are the cats ass, they are fun but my crap Chinese 55cc saws will outrun my 10-10s all day
Yeah. I totally dig old saws, but they just can't EVEN keep up.
Id love to see a wack off between hard wood vs Soft wood.
This is a fantastic idea!
I'd love to have me a Makita! Good ,bad , Id like to own one regardless.
This one is REALLY nice.
I saw this coming before I clicked on the video
I sure didn't. The Stihl felt faster. I was clearly wrong!
I run both of these saws. Honestly I prefere the Dolmar to the Stihl. It only matches in my brain. Could the Dolmar realy be the better saw looking at all the hipe about the 500i? In the real world it is!😊
Here all we cut is pine and birch. Would love go try some actuall hard wood. Cutting oak here is not something we want to do.
Stihl DOES have the best advertising!
l like any saw l can start and cut with!
Well I have Doug fir and white oak both in my back yard to test saws on . I better get some data logged here. I'm not going to get into a wood debate.
Hahaha you crack me up "DP & wack off is what my wife heard 🤣 😆
No. She heard the whole thing, but her ears perked up when she heard DP and Wack-Off. She's got a filthy mind. She's a keeper!
14" round is 154 sq/in.
14" square is 196 sq/in. None of which is bark or softer outer wood though as well.
That is great info! Thanks! How big of a round would I need in order to match the 196 sq/in of my kant?
@@novicelumberjack math comes out to about 15.8". It definitely seems about right. But the cant is solid wood with no bark. And the outer layers of sapwood are softer and less dense. Not sure exactly how much so it would be but when it comes to cutting speed, but a cant made up of nearly zero at least outer sap wood would be harder and denser overall than a 16" round stripped of bark. Even if it were out of the further end of the same log.
I like that you get it. These square kants are a real chore for these saws.
@@novicelumberjack I do think that this is about as fair a test as it can be. No matter what, theirs always variables with saws and wood. Given daily temperatures, pressures, and tuning will make saws cut in wide variations even if they are auto-tuning (obviously more so if not). An imperfect tune on a 70cc saw will make it cut right with or a bit behind a well tuned or auto-tuning 60cc saw. Just for example.
Then even wood cut from the same tree will vary widely in density and grain direction. So cutting rounds where there will inevitably be wide variation in size, shape, grain, and hidden knots limits your potential for repeatable results.
However, removing sapwood, and cutting cants like this eliminates as many variables as you can in the wood side. Sure, there will be a knot or two here and there and a little variation in grain, but long cants are cut out of straighter sections of log with less variation to begin with. And you can use the same semi-dry cants for longer periods of time and test a vast array of saws using the same pattern of cant and your results are repeatable to a far higher degree. A 14" cant from 3 years ago out of oak from even just your general region will be very similar in how it cuts to one cut the same way this week there, and your tests should be very close to repeating. That's all you really can ask for for chainsaw comparisons.
Redbull661 I believe is his channel name tests saws using stacks of oak railroad ties for this same reason.
And as you say yourself, just because a saw might cut a hair faster in the cants doesn't necessarily make it a superior saw to one that may just be better to live with. One that tunes better, or is lighter, or when it comes to saws about the 60cc class on up, I'd like to see you add a 3rd piece of cant and run a 21"x14" longer bar test to test the differences of how a saw that has more bottom might be as fast or faster than a zippy saw that possibly beat it in the smaller wood. You get into so rather large oak where you cut, so this is a viable real world type test. No the 14" depth wouldn't emulate a full size 21" test but cutting 21" worth of heartwood for 14" of depth would be enough to show the difference I'd think.
@@novicelumberjack I'm an Easy Coast hardwood guy too. While I've helped remove some large willows, cedars, and poplars, with the odd big pine, the vast majority of my cutting experience is on hardwoods from 3"-33" just to throw a number at it. Sure, we have some 4'+ silver maples and plenty of 3' hard maple, beech, yellow birch, and cherry around but for general firewood work, handling wood much above 2' in diameter is not fun in any way.
Going from 24-28" willow to blocking even 16" hardwood is a shocking difference in how hard it works a saw. Of course running a chain set up for softwood with lower rakers will be almost unserviceable in hardwood unless you are up in the 90+cc range. And then it will just be unenjoyable. Currently my 394xp is filed a bit too aggressive for dry hardwood. I blocked some dead dry hardwood the other day and anything more than self-feeding will pretty much cut it out. I couldn't use the dogs at all. To be fair, I was only using it because it needed to be run. The largest blocks were only about 18". And filed as such, it was a damn lightsaber if you did your part and got the pressure right. But in wood that size, my muffler modded, very broken in, echo 590 is really what I should have been running as far as what makes sense for it. It's a really good firewood saw. Sure, the hotter saws are probably more fun to run, which is why I ran a tank and a half through a dual port muffler modded 8-pin 394 (8-pin is also probably a reason it wouldn't pull the overly aggressive chain with pressure) but sometimes fun wins out. As far as pure production goes, the echo just smoothly cuts really well. It is surprisingly quick with a well sharpened chain because it doesn't scream at you and just happily chugs along whether it's in 8" or 18" wood. Really forgiving and easy to run power delivery.
👍
Put 36” bars on both and try it again. Be interesting.
Dolmar makita 7910 the besst chainsaw
Did Makita buy out Dolmar?
Yes, I heard somewhere in the 1990's.
@@johnlincicum6390 thanks so much. I also thought I read that somewhere else but wasn’t sure.
@@nicholasblohowiak29 You're welcome! All gas saw production stopped March 31st this year though.
Someone smarter and more patient than me is probably buying as many NOS Dolkita saws and parts they can get their hands on.
@@jimholz1102 👋
more pull in the old makita lol
had no doubt that the Kita was gonna whoop that Stihl!
Thing runs damn good. I'll likely be porting that one as well. Should be cool to port.
Anyone who's ever run a Makita or dolmar knew this way before but watched to confirm by how much lol Stihl is a good saw but I have had better results from the makitas
Put a bark box on the 500l and then test them both that way they both have a muffler mod and then it’s %100 fair
Actually, Randy already corrected me. The Makita only has the screen removed, not even a real muffler mod. But...one could also say, just put fuel injection on the Makita, then it would be fair.
@@novicelumberjack I guess it was pretty fair then lol
I thought about buying one of the new 7900s if I could pay you to port it
@@lumberjacksons4468 well the saw in this video will be getting ported by me for sure. So we'll get to see what I can do with them. I'm looking forward to it!
The 500i is probably alot nicer to limb with. Which is what actually takes the most time.
If I saw someone limbing with a 500i, I'd wonder weather they were on drugs, or if they were born dumb. Seriously. These big oaks have MASSIVE crowns. If you are climbing with a 500i, that's crazy. If it is already on the ground and you limb out the crown with a 500i, you'll die of exhaustion. Lots of lifting the saw overhead to reach the crazy big branches. The smaller saws are for limbing. Big tall straight pines, firs, and birch wouldn't be so bad, but still...why would anyone want to use an 80cc saw for cutting tiny little branches? Just...seems silly to me.
Little wood = little saw
Big wood = big saw
Every west coast fir sent to the mill was limbed with the same saw that cut the pie. 🤷🏽♂️
I personally know 2 tree guys that run ms 462’s and 500i’s in the tree. They don’t like to haul sever saws up, when chunking trees up they start with a 201t and work as far as the 16” 201 will cut then they’ll go to the 500i or 462.
@@christopherlehman4045 here we almost never need a 462 while climbing, a 16" 201t or 540xp is more than enough.
To bad the 500i didn't also have a muffler mod like the Dolmar. I've muffler modded many modern saws and it always makes a difference, some significant.
And no, I'm not a Stihl fan boy or a 500i owner, nor will I be as I have no need for a saw that large. The fact is I own many saws of many brands including Dolmar, Dolmar Makitas and Makita made by Makita plus Stihl, poulan, Echo, Homelite ect. I like saws that perform as I need them to regardless of color or label.
I haven't looked inside the 500i muffler, but I bet it wouldn't make much of a difference. I've been noticing a trend with the new saws...their fuel delivery is so good, they aren't trying so hard to create a converter out of their mufflers. Therefore, the mufflers are just an open can. My 592xp is like that. The Domar on the other hand, relied heavily on a catalytic type muffler to meet emissions standards. In this scenario, it probably put the two saws on even footing rather than giving one an advantage.
The 500i has a huge lop sided deflector that directs the exhaust to the side of the can furthest away from the outlet on the other side and the outlet is fairly small on the can so yes a 500i gains a fair amount.