The story goes like this. One tree in our neighbours back yard is growing across and over our land . It's creating a problem for the pool equipment and solar array on the workshop roof. The leaves and pods are also filling the workshop gutters creating a potential fire hazard.
I was getting ready to trim the overhanging branches when the neighbour came out and asked me not to do it as it was Spring and birds were nesting in the tree. She then said she would have the tree pruned at the end of the nesting season. That was two years ago! The tree is now even more of an issue.
Jan and I discussed the problem and decided to buy a suitable saw to prune the now larger tree. A reasonable quality manual pole saw would cost approximately $100 whilst a battery powered pole saw was $120. A powered pole saw seemed the better option.
Not wanting to rush to a decision we took some time to reflect. It became obvious the pole saw would be used very infrequently. My thoughts turned to a chainsaw. At various times during our early married life we owned two. A small Black & Decker and a larger Husqvarna. Moving to Australia resulted in us no longer having a wood burning fire and they were sold.
Rather than considering a petrol chainsaw my attention was drawn to battery powered chainsaws. They are small and light, but with sufficient power to do moderate work. I've been standardizing my battery power tools on DeWalt. Specifically their 18V series. Currently I have four tools and two 18V 4Ah batteries. Looking at battery powered chainsaws I noted DeWalt had an 18V saw. It was retailing at $325 without a battery. However TotalTools had it on special for $329, including the battery. The battery usually cost $99 and $4 for the battery seemed a bargain.
The new toy
I took one of my batteries to TotalTools and confirmed my existing DeWalt batteries were compatible with the saw.
I'm very impressed with the saw. It cut some sizeable tree limbs without any difficult. It's also much quieter than a petrol chainsaw
Jan then pointed out I could take it with me on outback trips where it could be used for tasks such as cutting firewood or remove fallen trees blocking tracks.
4 comments :
Of course, it would be antisocial for anyone to point out that, in association with an outback trip, the chainsaw could facilitate the removal of a troublesome neighbour!
I look forward to the post where you detail the upgrade of your e-bike to DeWalt 18v power :-)
Tree poison for the neighbour. Don't you mean downgrade the e-bike from 36V to 18V :-)
We, or John, has a number of chainsaws, I have lost count. We changed our one in the van to a battery operated one, and we are very impressed. His brand is Milwauke, and has slowly bought battery versions of all his tools in the shed. We live on acreage, and I think we have 4 petrol ones. In reality, as he has got older, he only uses the smallest and lightest ones. Last big trees that cames down, the back neighbour who is decades younger than us, came and cut them up for us.
Catherine I would describe myself as a "late adopter". I was impressed with the DeWalt battery tools used by the joiners when fitting out Waiouru and decided to go down that route. My brother-in-law is a plumber and he uses Milwaukee. I was slightly surprised to discover DeWalt is owned by Black & Decker. I previously purchased a battery drill from Aldi. The quality of the battery pack was very poor and I ended up replacing the cells with some I recycled out of a laptop. Consequently I will buy 240V tools from Aldi but not battery powered.
Post a Comment