Planned Obsolescence?! Why Would STIHL and ECHO Do This?!

now I don't like calling out the biggest manufacturers in the small engine industry but this is [Music] hey y'all thanks for tuning back into chicanic I hope everybody's having a great week yes I have a doozy for you today yes I have known about this for quite a long time and no I have not said anything because I have a hard time calling out some of the biggest Small Engine manufacturers in the industry but the fact is is this is really screwed up and I want to tell you all about it but before we get into today's video if you're a fan of saving time money and frustration while fixing your own Small Engine equipment while watching in-depth tutorials you've come to the right place because that's what I do I upload a couple times a week and if that sounds interesting hit that like button smash that subscribe don't forget to hit the notification Bell and please leave a comment I love to read through the comments and I'll reply to all the early commenters so why are we here I had a customer come in today with their almost brand new looking steel fs56 trimmer and when they came in everything was fine with the engine it ran great and they had been using this Gear Head with this head on it and shield but they said that that um it was making a sound it would not spin anymore it didn't have a Thrust plate on it which I thought was odd it had large holes in the back of the gear Head here and with further inspection I realized this isn't even the gear Head that's supposed to be on that trimmer anyways so I wondered why would this almost brand new trimmer have a used probably steel FS 85 still fs55 something like that gear head and head on it it sort of was a little odd to me but then I remembered wait a minute they've changed something and with the trend I've been showing you about all of those upgrades all these manufacturers are doing you know the changes are never better so let me take you in the back of the shop I'm going to show you a bunch of gear heads from trimmers of the past and show you exactly what's on them so this is the very back of the shop where I keep trimmers and chainsaws hedge trimmers blowers and stuff that are ready for customers to be picked up or ones that I've decided to hold on to and one thing I want to show y'all is all of these trimmers have something in common they all have crease plugs grease plug that's an old steel that's a Husqvarna we come to another Steel in Husqvarna this one's got a grease plug this one has a grease plug we come over to the back here to some junkers that I have we got a shindawa and it's got a grease plug we got an Old Echo it's got a grease plug I've got another steel I'm gonna tell you it's got a grease plug it's probably FS 91 or oh it's a 90. crease plug so pretty much every single Straight Shaft trimmer that we've seen forever and ever and ever has had a grease plug for you to be able to grease your gear Head with well in a video I put out probably about a year and a half two years ago it was about the speed feed head the most awesome trimmer head you could possibly ever have if you have not used one of these yet you do not know what you're missing out on I do leave a link in the description box below of all of my videos so you can find that also you can find it at chicanic.com I'm promising guys get the universal one it fits on almost everything there is a list on that original video that I will leave a link right up here if you want to check that out but speed feed head's awesome but the most common question I got on that video was sort of astounding to me that no one even knew that they had a grease plug on their Gear Head now why do you need to grease them that's because on most all Straight Shaft trimmers you have a shaft coming down that probably has a square or splined end on it that goes into your gear head and it will fit into one back end of a gear rides along another gear and these things roll at like 12 000 RPMs which is like 400 miles per hour and it just seems better if it has some lubrication I can tell you that the majority of all the trimmers that I get into the shop which is hundreds of them usually need grease in their Gear Head now I know you all loved the Briggs and Stratton video I made about their no oil change just checking ad you know engines so you're gonna really love this one or you're gonna say what the hell just like I am all right so we have a steel FS 56rc and we're gonna go on up to this gear head and I don't know guys what are we missing here where's the grease plug this is the hole that you stick it in to lock it to get your head off and uh there's no grease plug guys that's all I got to say about it nobody agrees it nope no I'm not gonna leave out Echo I've got a brand new SRM 225 and uh I don't see any grease plug this is not a grease plug this is just a screw to hold it in place in the shaft so it doesn't move back and forth on you and keep it tightened down no there is no grease plug but as you can see here this one has been used and abused a little bit but it's still an srm225 and it still had a grease plug but that's not all let me shock you a little more now I'm fixing to let you in on the most awesome money saving trick ever if you need to buy another Gearhead for one of these trimmers the echo one that is greaseable is a hundred and fifty dollars the steel ones are about a hundred and fifty dollars do not buy either one of these both of these units come in a different version as a Combi or a split boom trimmer which means the center of the shaft comes apart and you're able to put other kinds of attachments on there if you need one for the echo you can actually get an entire lower end shaft which you can just throw away but you get the gear Head a new shield and a head where all you have to do is pop it on with one screw for 89.99 or 99.99 depending on what store you go to so the head alone is like 35 dollars that's an awesome deal same way with the steel it's a hundred and nine dollars to buy just the split boom end you can just throw away the shaft part put the gear head right on there with one screw and you've got a brand new forty Dollar Head why they sell just the gear Head for 150 bucks but an entire Gear Head with head and shield and shaft for 100 bucks I don't get it so what do you guys think I mean do I got any Engineers out there that can tell me how they magically came up with two gears that can run together at 12 000 RPMs or 400 miles per hour and never need any grease added to it I don't think so I think it's all the same parts and they just decided to take the grease plug out and I don't understand that at all and I just want to let you all know about it now I do have to admit that in 12 years of selling Echo I have never once had to warranty a gear head with a grease plug I do not know about these yet and I can say the only ones I've ever had to replace were ones that were completely worn out from just abuse of commercial users and never greasing them now in the Steels I've changed out tons of them mostly because this town has a lot of Steel people in it and I just see them a lot more than I see the other brands mostly it's been from abuse not greasing them and commercial use so even without the plug you're gonna probably be able to keep your trimmer going for a long time and the gear Head might be fine but I just still don't understand why would they get rid of this this one little extra thread and bolt to be able to grease your gear Head so guys hopefully this video will save you time money and frustration in the future if you haven't found me on Facebook find me at facebook.com mechanic find me an Instagram at the real chicken you can find me at chicanic.com where you get your own t-shirts hoodies and long sleeve shirts thanks guys and have a great day [Music] foreign does offer a five-year warranty for any manufacturer defect I'm up at the shop at night and somebody is driving a mower past what it's 9 30. he just knocked on the door too and wanted to come in and items down when we're closed because I'm here by myself something's crawling around in my ceiling and it sounds huge

Channel: Chickanic

Views: 422,839

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Id: wiX81XPYt6M

Length: 9min 39sec (579 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 21 2023