Love my Echo Pas. So worth the money having the automatic feeder.

Taps86 wrote:

Looks easy enuff. Any idea if these are universal? I have a Husqvarna curved shaft trimmer.

kcramer wrote:

Only reason I went with echo was the Warranty. Both are great brands.

Taps86 wrote:

I eventually looked up instructions on how to load mine a couple of years ago and realized I had been doing it wrong. The right way was easier than what I had been doing, and it works great.

z6joker9 wrote:

LOL! Just about threw mine across the yard yesterday. Went and bought the grass gator blades. Who knows how they'll work. I can see them shattering and impaling me in the leg when I hit something solid though.

JKilburn wrote:

Looks easy enuff. Any idea if these are universal? I have a Husqvarna curved shaft trimmer.

kcramer wrote:

Only reason I went with echo was the Warranty. Both are great brands.

Taps86 wrote:

I put a Rapid Loader on my Shindaiwa.... I'm not sure if it was the Echo brand loader but they do make a universal one... 😟

DrafterX wrote:

Love my Echo. Had it for almost 14 years now. A friend owns a landscape business and I asked him to buy me one the next time he was getting some for his work.

Go online and type in your model number, the manuals should come up as part of your search. Echo parts are readily available for purchase online. The right parts fit and work easily in the units. There is a new type of feeder head that I purchased a few years back. You just line up the arrows on the bottom of the head, push each end of the trimmer line into the hole, then wind the string into the head. When the string is tight across the bottom of the head, you cut it in the middle and you are ready to go. Very simple and works great. Buy yourself a large spool of the square line or the line with the titanium chips embedded in it and you are good for many years.

madspackler wrote:

Ummm, aren't most "good" trimmers auto feed? Still, eventually, you're gonna run out of string.

????? the Automatic rapid feeder head...

The string is universal (typically)...I doubt buying the string already in the spool is universal if you plan on just doing it plug-n-play. Restringing is one of those things you don't do very often so it seems each time you do it, you're relearning...and getting frustrated all over again. But it's really not THAT hard, and it's cheaper to buy a big spool of string rather than the whole apparatus. The toughest part, to me anyway, is getting the spool open because it's usually sealed pretty tight with crap from use, and remembering which way to turn it to open it up...IIR it's opposite of what you typically would do to tighten bolts, etc...for example it's not lefty-loosey, right-tighty, but righty-loosey, lefty-tighty.

??????????

But the one thing that sucks, that I've found, is that most lawn equipment shops carry an abundance of Stihl parts, but not Echo (unless you just go online). I have an Echo trimmer that the bulb dried and rotted, along with some of the gas lines, and trying to find replacement parts (though I haven't scoured the area) is a PITA. Home Depot generally carries universal parts and some Echo parts, but I can never seem to find an exact match for my model #...and I'm not sure how universal the universal parts are.

daveincincy wrote:

I can see them shattering and impaling me in the leg when I hit something solid though.

JKilburn wrote:

One time I had the metal brush blade on my old machine hit a piece of rebar buried below leaf level. An inch long sliver of the blade shattered off, went through the rubber face piece on the filter mask I was wearing, and penetrated to the bone on my chin. I felt it hit and sting but didn't think anything about it until blood started to pool in the bottom of the mask. I now ALWAYS wear eye protection.🌫

riverdog wrote: