Echo CHAIN SAW SAFETY MANUAL - Manual (Page 13)

13
WARNING! Hold the saw firmly with both hands. Make sure your left thumb is
always on the underside of the front handle. Never over the top! Keep your left arm
straight with the elbow locked to prepare for any sudden or unexpected reaction of
the chain saw, and to maintain better control.
WARNING! Do not let the tip or nose of the saw come near any solid object
while the chain is rotating. Never let the saw dip into the ground.
WARNING! Keep your body out of the path of a potential kickback as
follows:
DON’T CROWD THE SAW
PLANE
OF CHAIN
ROTATION
THUMB ON
UNDER SIDE OF
HANDLE BAR
BODY ENTIRELY TO ONE
SIDE OF PLANE OF CHAIN
ROTATION
STRONG
LEFT ARM
AND ELBOW
POSITION
FOR GOOD
CONTROL
GOOD
CONTROL
1. When making any vertical (bucking) cut, keep your body to the left of the
guide bar, out of the plane of chain rotation.
2. When making felling cuts, alongside the tree so that the direction and path
of a kickback would be away from and not toward your body. If necessary,
angle the cut to keep your body out of the kickback path, and be extra
careful to keep the bar nose in the clear.
3. During all cutting, do not bend towards or otherwise “crowd” the guide bar.
Cut only one piece of wood at a time.
WARNING! Do not thrust the nose of the saw into a pile of branches or
dense brush where you cannot see whether the nose is in the clear. A high
risk of kickback exists under such conditions. INSTALL THE KICK GUARD ®
DEVICE before attempting such applications.
When starting a cut, be ready to control any tendency of the saw to skate as it attempts to penetrate the wood. Kickback
will be a secondary reaction if the nose bar skates into something.
When completing an bucking cut, be ready to hold up the saw as it breaks into the clear, so it will not follow through
and cut your legs, feet or body, or contact an obstruction and kick back.
WARNING! Limit your cutting to the range within which you can fully control the saw. Don’t reach out when
cutting. Forces of gravity, falling branches or wood can cause you to lose your balance and increase the risk of injury.
Don’t make any cut above chest height, because a saw is difficult to control under such conditions. It can kick back or
fall on you.
WARNING! There is always an element of danger in boring, even when done by experts. Until you have
become an experienced operator do not attempt to plunge cut or bore with the nose of the saw.
Make limbing and pruning cuts one at a time. Whenever possible, stand on the opposite side of the tree from limbs being
cut, so the tree is a barrier between you, the saw, and the falling material.
OPERATING SAW WITHOUT THE KICK GUARD ® DEVICE