Chainsaw Repair

It should have primer if it is a '11 353/346.
I think they got primer after April '07 if I remember correct. Before that, no primer...
Same time as "New Edition" 346 was released that actually is same as 353 but with a couple tiny differences.

Correct about the arrival of the primer on this chassis. In fact all of the plastic case saws, 340/345/350 also received the primer at about the same time. Early 353'd not only didn't have the primer, they also didn't have the cat muffler.

What are you guys finding to best remove pine sap tar?

The BEST thing I have ever found to take pine sap off my hands is vegetable oil.  Put some in your palm and rub it around as you would a liquid soap.  It doesn't really take any scrubbing or rubbing.  Then just wash your hands normally with soap and water to take off the vegetable oil.  I never would have guessed this would work until I tried it, but it's the easiest way to get pine sap off my skin that I've ever tried. 

I've never tried it on a saw, but assume the veggie oil would work... though getting the veggie oil off the saw afterwards might be a bit more challenging than washing my hands.

I have found that wd-40 works best for youur hands, and wd-40 and degreaser for the saw.

Never heard of this, so I had to do some research.

It's not actually the cranks themselves. The part numbers for the cranks are for crankshaft assemblies which include bearings and seals. A look at the individual parts in those assemblies reveals that the only item that is actually different is the clutch side seal. The seal can be bought individually, but ordering the bearing includes the seal and therefore also has a different part number. Piston bearing is unchanged throughout.

Then I got carried a little away with this...........I couldn't really determine if the seals are interchangable between crankcases. There are some crankcase variations, but they don't correspond to the crankshaft changes. The cases were strengthened in 2002, (requires a new case gasket). There was another change in 99 with regard to fitting a different handguard, and they tell of making sure to check the crankcase modification code when installing the hand guard. There was also the change where they went to the finer thread cylinder bolts, but that is really just a hardware issue.

OK Kevin, no more questions that are this complicated!