chainsaws and loppers

a few years ago my dad bought a little electric chainsaw for use around our house. i'm not exactly sure what his thought process was, but i told him repeatedly that an electric chainsaw is pretty much useless and is probably more dangerous than a gas chainsaw. it makes sense right? the point of a chain saw is to walk around cutting up stuff that's too big to cut by hand. my dad's response was: well, it's okay because you'll just drag whatever you want to cut to where the saw is...yeah.

anyway, he never actually used it, and so over the weekend i broke it out for the first time to cut up a tree that came down over the winter and we had to move. annnnd, the conclusion: an electric chainsaw is not the most useless piece of equipment ever designed, but very close to it. there is a place for it, namely in that you don't need to start it every time you want to cut something, so it's good for small stuff that's in a clump. but, it has so little power. i was struggling to cut through pine trees that had been dead for years with it.

moral of the story: if you need a chainsaw, do yourself a favor and spend a little bit of money on it. it'll be so worth it in the long run. just get a nice husqvarna or stihl saw, don't waste your time with an electric, unless you're that rare person who has nice, neatly cared for woods and doesn't have any trees more than six inches in diameter.