Customer Reviews

Troy-Bilt CS 4265 208cc OHV Gas Powered Chipper/Shredder/Vacuum

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I bought one of these to deal with a large amount of brush at a house I bought in August of 2006. After about 2 weeks work, this chipper literally came apart.

Who I bought it from isn't at issue here, but, I took it back and they gave me a new one.

I used it maybe twice and then fall and winter set in and I didn't use it again until this spring (2007). The same issue arose. The problem is with its engineering. The machine uses blades that are attached by roll pins to do the chipping. The roll pins are kept in place with steel clamps that are probably inserted mechanically at the factory.

If debris, which is inevitable--it is, after all, a chipper--hits the side of the clamp, the clamp comes loose and flys off. These clamps usually fly into the discharge chute with no problem.

Then the real issue begins. Without the clamp, the roll pin that keeps the blade in place is spun out of its hole by the centripetal force. Once the pin has come loose, the blade comes loose, and it jams/destroys the entire chipping mechanism. Luckily, we caught this flaw on the "second machine" (the first machine self-destructed, but I was lucky and it did so before the warranty expired).

This is obviously an engineering flaw in the design--otherwise the clamps would not be needed in the first place. And who would design a cutter that used a roll pin in a situation that would immediately indicate the roll pin would be subjected to centrepidal forces, and thereby pushed out of its position of securing the blades.

Obviously the engineers who designed this did not graduate at the top of their class. I'm surprised they passed engineering school exams to begin with.

This piece of equipment has soured me on Troy-Bilt equipment entirely. It is an expensive piece of equipment that should naturally be expected to operate within its defined tolerances and not dangerously come apart at the seams because of obvious design flaws a high-school shop student could figure out.

These people have not done their quality control and should not be trusted. Don't buy this piece of equipment.

We bought a Troy Bilt chipper from a local dealer. It was advertised as "heavy duty" on the Troy Bilt site, "chips 3 inch limbs". We thought Troy Bilt was an established, reliable brand. Took it home, and it wouldn't even chip privet hedge clippings! Took it back, the dealer kept it a week (a small local hardware store) and the old man said he couldn't find anything wrong with it ("the engine runs fine") The engine does run fine - it just won't chip anything! MTD (the company that now owns Troy Bilt and has bought up several other brands) told us to take it to another local dealer. We did. They kept it almost a week, called to tell us it was 'fixed'. We got there and were told the blades were dull, the steel wasn't good quality and we might want to get aftermarket blades of better quality, but they'd sharpened them anyway (without asking us or suggesting we replace them with better blades) then demanded $65 for labor because the blades aren't covered under warranty. Of course, this chipper had been used all of one hour! Needless to say, we're outraged. MTD refuses to cooperate. We're filing a complaint with the Attorney Generals consumer office and maybe taking the dealer to small claims court(as local agent for the company) under the UDAP law (unfair and deceptive acts and practices act).
This chipper is worthless - definitely not heavy duty - barely even light duty since it couldn't handle 3/4 inch privet. It might have shredded leaves ok. Don't buy it, and for that matter, I'd stay away from anything made by MTD (they own many brands of lawn machines now) - their customer service is rude and not there to help you.

I have owned Troy Bilt products for 30 years.

Sprayers, mowers, and the like.

Loved them all.

They were well built and went on year after year after year.

I had a Troy Bilt Tomahawk Chpper that I had used for 25 years before it gave out.

I has heard Troy Bilt's quality had taken serious hits but bought this unit anyway.

BIG Mistake.

It jams repeatedy, it is poorly engineered and if you have more than a modest amount of chipping or shredding to do, you are going to be at it a long long time with this piece of junk.


No more Troy Bilt for me


Gry Hutchinson

This chipper was fine for a while. Then, when loading leaves into the chute, my wife accidently included a small piece of a branch - no more than one inch in diameter and two inches long. That destroyed the machine. It came apart internally as described by the other buyer - the clamp came off and a blade came loose badly damaging the flywheel. It is nearly $300 for a replacement flywheel. Then, shortly after repairing that, the engine literally exploded when the engine case cracked open throwing bits of case and oil everywhere. A replacement engine is around $500.
The engine case is about as thin as cardboard and looks like it's made of cheap sphelter. That's not to mention having to replace the oil seal after only a year of operation. If it was made of materials that could stand the strain of real work and if the spares were reasonably priced it would be OK; but as it is, it's an expensive lesson in modern junk manufacture.

This machine has a use.....unfortunately, it is not what it is advertised for. I got mine "nearly new" on Craigslist. I knew exactly what to expect....I have dozens of large gas powered tools...tractors, trenchers, 10 chain saws, splitters, sawmill, on and on. We know tools and machinery.
I wanted something to reduce garden waste to "chop" so that the chickens/pigs/ducks would scratch it down to compost faster. Corn stalks, corn shucks and cobs, Tomato plants, broccoli stalks, all the residue from 2 acres of organic garden. This machine is perfect for that.

We took out the chopper blade and sharpened it razor sharp, then polished all the surfaces on a flap sander. We pressure washed the blade/flail chopper and put a spray on black chain oil on the flail pivots. We also razor sharpened the chipper blades.

We harvested a 75'x75' plot of corn. The ears were shucked for cutting and freezing. It took 2 kids about 2 hours to run all the cobs.....all the shucks....all the stalks through the chipper green. If you want dry shredded bedding material, you will need to let everything sun-dry for a week. This was green chop that had enough corn grains in it to keep 75 chickens interested for 3 days. The stalks were run through the hopper and the chipper chute with equal success. THIS EFFORT WAS A RESOUNDING SUCCESS, AND REPRESENTS THE LIMIT OF WHAT THIS MACHINE WILL SAFELY AND EFFICIENTLY PERFORM. This is no more a "CHIPPER" than a car-window burger is "food". If you want to "chip" any sort of woody material, you need 17+hp and a lot more iron and mass. This is light stamped metal, and it shudders on a load of corn shucks and cobs. I will write a second review in the fall as we run the bedding material through it. About 30-50 pickup loads of leaves should get a measure of its value. Our flock of Muscovy Ducks will eat acorns if we drive over them and crush them....HMMMMMM....what if we ran hundreds of pounds of acorns through this for supplemental feed !! We will see. Cheers, Gorignak.

The engine is very difficult to start. It takes two men and a boy to pull the starter rope. No shut off on the gas. Important for winter storage, engine should be run out of gas. After third useage, the engine died--no spark. Troy does not stand by their entire product, the engine is under a Briggs warranty. When I called Briggs, the rep seemed to have limited knowledge concerning the engine. After a listening to elevator music for a long time, finally found out that I needed to get the engine to a dealer. Now of course the unit is very heavy, so if you live a long distance from a service center the shipping costs would be extreme; therefore, I am going to tear the engine apart and try to fix it myself. Wish me luck.

I have had the same experience as many of the other reviewers. This thing is a piece of garbage. I have had to take it apart (all the way apart because they sure didn't make it easy to get into the fly wheel compartment to look for the piece that is clanging and banging) three different times in the two years I have owned it. I rarely use it because it is such a pain - if anything is even slightly damp, it will clog almost immediately. I have learned the precise amount of leaves that can go in at a time because I have had to stop, turn it off and unclog it so many times (which usually requires practically crawling into the stupid thing to get to the clog) that I am now an expert. I have probably spent more time taking it apart (seriously, why did they use soooo many bolts? I had to remove at least a dozen poorly designed bolts that require one hand with pliers to hold it from spinning and one hand with a socket to actually unscrew just to get in to take a look inside) than I have spent using it. I am so angry at myself for buying this piece of crap. Thank goodness it was on sale.

I purchased the Troy-Bilt CS 4265 205cc Briggs & Stratton Series Gas-Powered 2-Way Feed Chipper Shredder from Amazon. The delivery was prompt and it was in excellent condition when it arrived. The chipper shredder has performed admirably.

The engine usually pull starts on the first attempt occasionally I have to pull twice to get it started. (It is an easy pull my 14 year old daughter has pull started it.) The shredder has chipped it way thru all of the branches from five hardwood trees I felled that were over 25 feet tall, about 75 bushes worth of chips and about 45 bushes worth of vines and brush I cleared this winter without ever bogging down.
It has shredded enough leaves to fill three compost bins that each measure 6ft long, 4.5 feet wide, and 4 feet tall.

The shredder's reduction ratio of 10:1 turns the leaves into very good mulch for the vegetable garden. I have use the 1/4 inch wood chips to mulch around the 8 trees of my front yard, about 15 bushes per tree.

I have read several bad reviews of the machine but I have never experience problems with this shredder, and the blades have remained sharp, then I noticed two of the reviewers purchased used machines so they had no idea if the machine had previously been abused or not.

Upon further inspection I saw other reviewers that had tried to chip branched larger than the chippers size limit and wondered why the machine broke. Another reviewer stated he used a 2x4 to push branches into the chipper; a 2x4 will not fit into the chipper chute so I seriously wonder about that review. Another review suggested a 15 horse power shredder was required, that would be a contractor grade commercial machine not a machine a normal home owner would need.

I borrowed my neighbors Troy bilt chipper / shredder yesterday and have the following to report.

PROS:
Fairly light to move around as long as tires have enough pressure. Pretty easy to pull start (as long as you are in decent physical shape). It does work as advertised but has very, very limited power.


CONS:
HARD TO FEED!! Safety options make it hard to operate. The shoot is TOO LONG and the small hole requires a lot of force to compress branches to get them in the grinding area. you toss in branches but then need to take a 2x4 or something like that to force them through the hole - think of a plunger and a toilet. Wide bowl that goes to a very small opening at the bottom. This can amount to a lot of work - I got tired doing it and I'm probably in much better shape than most users of this product.

Jam / stall:

when it stalls it takes 10 minutes or so to clear out - there is no clutch so when you try to pull start if there are chunks in the chopping area you can't pull the cord hard enough to spin the engine fast enough to get it to start. This forces you to clean everything out. A simple hatch on the bottom would provide a perfect exit.


damp / wet leaves or branches:
Clogged twice and was a filthy nasty rotting mess to clean!!!!

Insufficient power:
Unit bog down easily and it can be too late once it does to prevent a stall - this leads to having to clean it out before it will restart. Many engines are rated with artificial "peak" horsepower so 8.5 HP may actually be 6 HP? Using whatever rating system is used I recommend 12HP minimum and Ideally 16HP or more.

Chip exit:
The bag and the heavy metal bars and a piece of tin are designed to suppress chunks from flying out but this caused material to pile up and stick in the chute. I improved thing by: 1. removing the bag, 2. opening the tin shoot, 3. opening the heavy metal bars. The unit could get rid of all this and just have a stove pipe that allows the material travel a few feet and then go into a box or bucket the same way chippers have always been designed. Chain mesh is a better way to suppress flying chunks.

Sharpening Blades:
There are two blades one for thick branches up to 2 inches and the main "lawn mower" blade for regular branches and leaves. Bolts SAE instead of metric. I used my Ryobi Drill / Driver with the 3/8" socket adapter to speed up removal of the chute to access the main "lawnmower" blade. Then there are two Allen bolts with nuts on the back and a larger main bolt. All are normal (not reverse thread). I removed the blade and sharpened it with my angle grinder. The unit had never been sharpened and was performing poorly as a result. Unit appears designed so you will take it to the dealer to get it sharpened but this requires time and a trailer or truck. I would much prefer to see a unit that is easy to service to keep blades nice and sharp whether you do it or take the blade to your dealer.

What to look for in a chipper:
1. 16HP or more.
2. a clutch to start / stop the blades or some sort of delay start so the engine spins up then engages the blades.
3. a much shorter feed shoot AND / OR and something like a garbage disposal where you put branches in and close the lid and then pull a lever to safely push the items into the blade.
4. double blades so you don't need to sharpen as often.
5. easy quick access to the clear the blades when a jam happens with a safety so the engine can't be started and run while clearing the blades.
6. longer chute that allows lots of room for the blades to fling out chopped material and keeps dust away from the unit.
7. Exhaust pipe! The muffler spits exhaust all over the operator and your cloths stink!
8. Make sure unit is easy to clean and there is a simple screen over the carburetor so branches can't get in there.
9. Shorter unit - ideally with 4 wheels - it is easy for the unit this unit to tip over.
10. ELECTRIC START - can you afford not to have this? How much will a back or shoulder operation cost or lost time at work due to a pulled muscle?