Outdoor Power Equipment (Lawn Mowers, Snow Blowers, Chain Saws and more) Discussions

One guy from MSP area is selling his 15 year old HS621 (the guy from Wayzata MN who hates HomeDepot and GC engines) for $450.  Another one is selling his one year old HS520 for $400 with one year remaining on the warranty.  HS621 is a nice machine but is it really worth more than nearly new HS520?  Replacement parts for HS520 is about 50% of the cost of HS621. What do I recommend for a friend?  I think the HS621 from that guy is simply way too high (if it were as good as aa335 then it is a different story).  HS520 seems like an economical option.  What do you guys think?

Here's some photos of the single stage herd. The HS621 I got last spring and the HS520 are going on CL shortly. The keeper HS621 is the one in the middle.

Here's the HS621 I'll be selling off.

Here's the HS520 I've been disappointed with.

Here's a few of the keeper HS621.

Did you swap all the good parts to the keeper HS621? 

aa335 wrote:
Of course! I had just replaced the paddles and scrapper on the old one so I swapped those out first. The ones that were on the keeper were not bad and still had plenty of meat left on them and the scrapper bar was good as well. Both the HS621 & HS520 are in good shape and run well. The keeper HS621 is just in much better condition than the other one as it was a one owner machine and was well cared for and maintained.

Yeah, yeah, nice machines......

WTF is all that wood about?  You selling it?   That's quite a supply. 

You do your own splitting?  If so, what do you use? 

borat wrote:
I heat my home with wood (close to 100% of the time). It's about 50/50 between buying cut/split/delivered and doing it on my own.  I use a Fiskars X series splitting axe which is really nice and does a great job - best splitting axe I ever used. I've thought about getting grapple loads of wood but barely have enough time to process what I have already. I go through about 4+ cord per winter -  I have over 7 cord racked for this winter and some for next. It never ends...

That's quite a supply. 

We have a couple zero clearance wood fireplaces in our home that we use primarily for ambiance or emergency heat.

We also heat our cottage with wood and put up maybe a cord or two a year.  Don't go out much in the winter anymore so, don't use as much as we used to.  I generally cut and split my own.  I used a splitting maul for 30 years but some of the wood was murder to split by hand. 

Most of the wood I get is blow down so I have no control over the size of the trees.  I've had trees over 30" across and knotty as hell.  Wicked stuff to split by hand.  Earlier this year we had a wind event that knocked down some nice aspen trees approx. 16" to 18" in diameter.   So I bucked up a few trailer loads.  Splitting wet poplar that size in summer by hand is almost futile.  The axe literally bounces out of the wood and sometimes water spurts out of it.  Dried poplar is just as bad but opposite.  The wood is very reluctant to split and the axe gets stuck in the piece.  I had a stack of large dried stuff from last year that I just gave up on and with the new supply, I decided it was time to get a log splitter so I picked up a used one in excellent shape for a very good price.  It's a gas powered 24 ton North Star.  I split all of that difficult wood in an hour or less then split a bunch for my neighbour.  

When I think of all the time I spent flogging myself senseless splitting difficult wood, I have to wonder what I was thinking when a log splitter would cut my labour by 90%.  It's so easy that I actually look forward to splitting wood!   Even the wife gets in on the act.  I do the loading, she works the splitter.  The benefits aren't just split wood.  I don't spend the whole day swinging an eight pound maul so I can spend more time fishing/hunting/relaxing and I don't wake up the next day feeling like I spent the night tumbling in a cement mixer.     

I prefer to buy c/s/d (if the price is right) but sometimes I'll buy a truckload of 16" - 18" long rounds and split them. I live in a remote area where there is no natural gas lines so your choices for heat are (for the most part) oil, propane or wood. I have oil which is currently running about $3:50 or so per gallon. Before I got my wood stove, I would use on average about 800 - 1000 gallons/year - my water is heated via the oil burner so it fires all year long. You can see how it adds up pretty quickly. I can heat my house with wood for about $600 - $800 vs. $2800 - $3500 for oil so it's definitely worth my time and effort.

MN_Runner wrote:

Hi MN_Runner,

Got half an inch of snow on the day after I came back to the US but that was not enough to pull the snow blower out.

If we get snow I will take pictures and post.

We got about 2" of wet snow on the eve of Dec 31.  I blew the snow with my 928 because it was too wet and I did not want to shovel it.  This Monday I helped a family friend buy a brand new Honda HS520.  She really liked the size and how simple it was to use.  I told her if she ever thought the HS520 is too small, I was willing to trade my 928 for her 520+cash.  I still think having two blowers are the best option.  2" wet snow would have been perfect for a SS machine.