Chainsaw runing a little rough. I need some small engine repair advice.

I have a Craftsman chainsaw that is 10 years old. It does a good job most of the time.

Recently it has been having troubles re-cranking.

I crank as per instructions
6 pumps on primer bulb
full choke 5 pulls
half choke pull until it cranks (2-3 pulls)and get to cutting.

When ever I kill it or it runs out of gas I have difficulties re-cranking afterwards.

Fill with fuel
no priming this time
full choke for 2-3 pulls until it attempts to crank
half choke it cranks immediately revs and dies in seconds. Faster than I can get my hand on the throttle trigger.


So I adjusted the idle speed screw slower as per manf. instructions and it seemed to help. But I still ran into the problem. I adjusted the idle speed screw slower and the problem would resolve for a bit. This repeated several times until I actually adjusted to idle speed screw too far and it came out. I replaced it, screwed down until tight and then backed it off 2 full turns. Got saw cranked and adjusted the idle screw as per manf instructions.

next day same issues all over again.


Concerned it was somehow flooding, I did a fuel line dump. I tilted chainsaw to the side, fish the fuel line filter stone out of the tank and press the prime bulb several times until the fuel line is clear. The carb has an overflow drain that allows the pressure from the primer bulb to push any fuel in the carb back into the tank.

put fuel line back in tank and close it up
no prime
full choke 5 pulls
half choke cranks on first pull and idles fine
off to cutting






The problem is it keeps occurring and will do so randomly. I can kill it and re-crank it fine a few times then it will simply not crank unless I repeat the fuel line dump procedure above.