The Milwaukee M18 chainsaw is such a good tool I had to write a review here. Sure it is a bit big for chopping down tiny weed plants that are ready to harvest. But if you do any outdoors stuff this is a must have. Even for someone who goes camping a few times a year this is a worthwhile investment if you can afford it.
The amount of power that can come out us such and small and unsuspecting package is what does it for me. I’ve had friends with gas chainsaws asking to borrow the M18 after seeing what it can do.
Uses I have found for the electric chainsaw:
- Firewood
- Camping trips
- Clearing ATV/Snowmobile trails
- Cutting shooting lanes for my deer stand (while making minimal noise)
- Demolition work (e.g. quickly removing wood studs in a demo project)
- Yard work – trimming dead branches and general pruning
- Chainsaw carving
Clearing ATV/Snowmobile trails

This large white pine was no match for the m18 chainsaw, even though the log was thicker than the 16″ bar. It only took 20 minutes of cutting and consumed 2/4 bars on the 12 ah battery. I made a few smaller cuts down the road and still ended the day with 2/4 bars.

The M18 Chainsaw is feather light
The M18 is mind blowingly light. The entire unit with the 12 amp battery weights in at only 13.9 lbs. This thing can follow you wherever you go.

No Gas, All the Power
Much like electric cars there is no torque curve, the torque graph is a flat line. This means you don’t need to get the RPM up to keep the saw from bogging down like with a gas chainsaw. According to Milwaukee it reaches full throttle in under 1 second.
Also there’s no worry about getting it started in cold weather, gummed up carburetors, fuel stabilizers, mixing oil and gas in the right ration, gas spilling out in your car trunk etc.
Milwaukee claims the 12ah battery delivers 150 cuts in 6×6 cedar. I’ve found this to be a representative sample. Hard to quantify how much cutting you can do but I can chop enough firewood for a week long camping trip on one charge without issue. It seems to charge up as quickly as it is depleted. I’ve never felt like I ran out of power too early.
I have tried my 5.0 ah batterys in the M18 and they do work but you deff want to buy the kit with the 12 amp hour battery to get the full power out of the tool.
Safety
Always wear protective eyewear and earmuffs when operating a chainsaw. This saw is so quiet I usually omit the earmuffs, but it’s not a bad habit to have… especially if cutting all day. Chainsaw pants are never a bad idea either.
How to Sharpen a Milwaukee M18 Chainsaw.
Always remember to keep the chain sharp. I would recommend sharpening it every 5 battery charges, or anytime it touches dirt or rocks. This can very quickly dull a chain and should be avoided.
In order to sharpen the Milwaukee M18 chainsaw you need the Husqvarna 531300080 3/8-Inch Low Profile Saw Chain Filing Kit. If you happen to already have a sharpening kit, to sharpen the low profile M18 chain you need a 5/32 round file.
For how cheap they are I always recommend always having a spare chain on hand.
Axes and Splitting Mauls
If you happen to be chopping firewood, I cannot recommend anything more strongly than the Fiskar line of splitting maul, splitting axe and hatchet.

It is remarkable to me that two products that look so similar can have such vastly different effectiveness. I learned about these tools from a logger in Algonquin park. My reaction was incredulous as I had a full set of maul, axe and hatchet from princess auto that I thought worked ok.
Boy was I wrong. The effort required to split a log with a fiskar axe is maybe 25% of the effort required with my regular axes. I don’t know if is the hollow handle, weight balance, teflon coated hardened steel or a combination of all three but the difference is remarkable.

REMINDER: Just like with any gas chainsaw you will need to keep the bar oil topped up. This lubricates the chain during cutting.