Shindiawa back pack blowers

[jekjr]

I am a STIHL guy. Why? Because I have had a good experience with there products, but it doesn't meen I hate all the other brands out there. The main goal is to run something that is good and supported by manny local dealers for easy parts access. In some places, I have seen ECHO everywhere and not so much STIHL. Where I live it is all STIHL and if I go out for a drive in another town, there is a tone of ECHO.

My friend works at railroad tracks and uses leaf blowers to clear snow off the rail road tracks all night non stop. They use to have STIHL BR600 blowers and each year they would breack. Now, they have changed to Shindaiwa, which has more power for the money and he uses it all night. I think he goes thru 10$ of gas on one blower in one night. Even tho he is using a Shindaiwa blower, it doesn't mean STIHL is bad. He still recommends it, but he does say that the leaf blower is better.

I agree with you on the fact that some machines one manufacturer makes are better than others and vice versa. To be honest coming from the dealer I bought from Iw as amazed. They have been A Stihl dealer for a long time.

I have not used a big back pack of either brand. This is my first. We always used handhelds to do what we had to get done. Probably will use them still primarily because they are light and easy to handle and get the job on sidewalks and small driveways ect done.

Because I see the service some other guys here are getting out of the Shindiawa trimmers I plan to buy one of those this summer as well.

 

[Ric]

I am a STIHL guy. Why? Because I have had a good experience with there products, but it doesn't meen I hate all the other brands out there. The main goal is to run something that is good and supported by manny local dealers for easy parts access. In some places, I have seen ECHO everywhere and not so much STIHL. Where I live it is all STIHL and if I go out for a drive in another town, there is a tone of ECHO.

My friend works at railroad tracks and uses leaf blowers to clear snow off the rail road tracks all night non stop. They use to have STIHL BR600 blowers and each year they would breack. Now, they have changed to Shindaiwa, which has more power for the money and he uses it all night. I think he goes thru 10$ of gas on one blower in one night. Even tho he is using a Shindaiwa blower, it doesn't mean STIHL is bad. He still recommends it, but he does say that the leaf blower is better.

In reality the shindiawa doesn't have more power than the Stihl it just seems to be that way to some. They get there power from changing tube dimensions, longer and smaller tubes than Stihl uses the same as Echo. You can see that happen on there site when they change from their round tube to their turbo tube it changes the cfm's and velocity's. There's a big difference in using there blower with a 471/2 inch tube that's 2 1/2" in diameter vs a Stihl 40" tube that is 3 1/2" diameter and if you check spec's you'll find there both just over 700 cfm tube volume and their housing speeds are so close to being the same it's not measurable to the user.

 

[Mike88se]

So Shindaiwa has a better designed tube that makes their blower do as good a job as more powerful blowers that use more gas. I think that's a good thing.
I used to have a Japanese car w/ a small 6 cylinder engine. It smoked most Z28s and 5.0 and 4.6 Mustangs. It got better gas mileage, handled better, and was more dependable too.
Had some well designed tubes in it
The first blower I bought was an eb240 hand held. It was ancient and well used when I bought it. The guy I bought it from bought it from a local county maintenance dept. It would still start on the first or second pull when I sold it. Must have been about 25 years old. If walbro still made a carb for my eb45 I'd still be using it.
Shindaiwa is good.

 

[Ric]

So Shindaiwa has a better designed tube that makes their blower do as good a job as more powerful blowers that use more gas. I think that's a good thing.
I used to have a Japanese car w/ a small 6 cylinder engine. It smoked most Z28s and 5.0 and 4.6 Mustangs. It got better gas mileage, handled better, and was more dependable too.
Had some well designed tubes in it
The first blower I bought was an eb240 hand held. It was ancient and well used when I bought it. The guy I bought it from bought it from a local county maintenance dept. It would still start on the first or second pull when I sold it. Must have been about 25 years old. If walbro still made a carb for my eb45 I'd still be using it.
Shindaiwa is good.

Shindaiwa doesn't have a better tube designed, there just using there alterations to enhance there volume and velocity's to make there machines look better than they really are. As far as gas consumption goes I can't see two stroke using less gas than a four. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that Shin or Echo are bad blowers it's just my opinion they misrepresent themselves to the public for sales.

I run three different blowers, all Stihl just different sizes. The BR 200. 380, and 550 and you know which feels the strongest, it's the BR 380 but it's not. It doesn't have the cfm or the velocity of the 550 not close but what it does have is a 2 1/2" tube which makes it feel like it has more power but it doesn't move debris like the 550.

 

[jekjr]

From what the guy at the shop explained to me it would be the very newest Stihl Back Packs that he would steer away from. I see several comment that they have run Stihl for numerous years. He agreed but said that as a dealer they were seeing issues with the latest ones.

He has been a dealer and repair shop since the 1970's so I would figure he would pretty up to date on what was going on.

 

[Mike88se]

Shindaiwa doesn't have a better tube designed, there just using there alterations to enhance there volume and velocity's to make there machines look better than they really are.

To me a design that enhances volume and velocity is a better design. The Shindaiwa has a less powerful engine but the blower has comparable performance. Why is that not a better design? CFM and velocity is how a blower performance is measured right? Not by the size of it's engine. Just sayin
I'm not married to any particular brand either. You can look up any brand...stihl, echo, redmax etc and some of the people who have an opinion will say the product is the best no doubt whatsover and the rest will say it's junk. Most of it is opinion right?
But yeah I've been happy with my echo and shindy tools. I like my stihl edger too. Hell that $100 Hitachi blower I bought is great so far but its too soon to give a final opinion. It moves wet leaves and will knock over a coke can at 30" but it could crap out tomorrow. I enjoy talking about these things... hope it doesnt sound like arguing for the sake of arguing

 

[Ric]

To me a design that enhances volume and velocity is a better design. The Shindaiwa has a less powerful engine but the blower has comparable performance. Why is that not a better design? CFM and velocity is how a blower performance is measured right? Not by the size of it's engine. Just sayin
I'm not married to any particular brand either. You can look up any brand...stihl, echo, redmax etc and some of the people who have an opinion will say the product is the best no doubt whatsover and the rest will say it's junk. Most of it is opinion right?
But yeah I've been happy with my echo and shindy tools. I like my stihl edger too. Hell that $100 Hitachi blower I bought is great so far but its too soon to give a final opinion. It moves wet leaves and will knock over a coke can at 30" but it could crap out tomorrow. I enjoy talking about these things... hope it doesnt sound like arguing for the sake of arguing

There design of the tube doesn't change what cfm and velocity the motor puts out. Let me explain it this way. Take a straw that you would get with your soda from McDonalds and put it next to a one inch diameter pipe of the same length, now blow the same through both and tell me where the air flow is strongest, you haven't change the volume of air from one to the other the straw will feel stronger because the air has been condensed. Shindiawa, Echo both do the same thing by reducing there tube size. The engines put out the same volume and velocity it just seems stronger because it's been condensed like the straw. Think of it like shooting a shotgun, are you better off shooting or hitting something at 50ft with an open choke with a shot spread of 6ft or a full choke with a shot spread or 2 ft. It's the same with your blower the more condensed your air flow is the less debris you move and the more time you spend doing it. Oh btw the shin is 79.7cc the Stihl 600 is 64.8cc they have the less powerful engine but the blower has comparable or better performance for size.

 

[Ric]

From what the guy at the shop explained to me it would be the very newest Stihl Back Packs that he would steer away from. I see several comment that they have run Stihl for numerous years. He agreed but said that as a dealer they were seeing issues with the latest ones.

He has been a dealer and repair shop since the 1970's so I would figure he would pretty up to date on what was going on.

Seeing how the dealer is there to make money there going to tell you what ever that have to tell to sell the piece of equipment they can make the most money on. They have a bigger mark up on the Shin and Echo my dealer has told me that.

 

[Mike88se]

Shindaiwa doesn't have a better tube designed, there just using there alterations to enhance there volume and velocity's to make there machines look better than they really are.

There design of the tube doesn't change what cfm and velocity the motor puts out.

Ok now it's getting confusing. How is enhancing different from making it better? CFMs are CFMs. If the measurements are taken at the same place on each blower then it doesn't matter why the CFM of the smaller blower is different. And how is it not changing it if it's making it better? I get the straw thing but we're not talking straws here.

 

[Ric]

Ok now it's getting confusing. How is enhancing different from making it better? CFMs are CFMs. If the measurements are taken at the same place on each blower then it doesn't matter why the CFM of the smaller blower is different. And how is it not changing it if it's making it better? I get the straw thing but we're not talking straws here.

The straw thing is the basic principal behind what there doing, they make it seem stronger than it really is, that doesn't make it better. You're correct though cfm is cfm but it's the way they take the readings that are different. Echo and Shin take there readings at the housing and that's what they advertise, take the PB500t, they will tell you it's 465 cfm with 195mph performance and that's true for the housing but its average speed out the tube is 163 mph but they don't tell you what the cfm is out the tube. Stihl and a few other will give you cfm at both tube and housing like the BR600 mag. there spec's tell you there housing cfm is 1024 and there tube cfm is I think is 712 cfm at 201mph big difference in cfm readings right :smile: so now tell me what happened to the cfm for the PB500t when it drop its air velocity from 195 mph housing down to 163mph out the tube. :thumbdown: You are right though it gets real confusing, like someone else said and I agree people need to do there homework so they know what there getting.