Craftsman Chainsaws

How the Craftsman chainsaw range is organised

Craftsman is the odd one out among the tool-brand chainsaw ranges: it has not committed to a single power source. ChainsawData holds 14 Craftsman entries covering three of them — battery, corded electric and petrol — and the prefix tells you which one before you look at anything else.

Cordless (CMCCS…) — ten of the fourteen entries. Bars run from 15.24 cm on CMCCS320B and CMCCSL621B, through 20.32 cm on CMCCSP20B and 25.4 cm on CMCCS610B, up to 30.48 cm on CMCCS620M1 and CMCCS630P1. Nothing cordless in the range exceeds 30.48 cm. The stored use classes stay in the same territory: "pruning" for the 320, "routine trimming and storm cleanup" for the CMCCSL621, "outdoor cutting tasks" for the CMCCSP20.

Corded electric (CMECS…) — two entries, and both are longer than any cordless Craftsman: CMECS614 at 35.56 cm and CMECS600 at 40.64 cm.

Petrol (CMXGSAM…) — two entries, both 42 cc: CMXGSAMY42N6 with a 40.64 cm bar and CMXGSAMY42N8 with 45.72 cm. These are the only Craftsman saws with a recorded engine displacement and the only ones that reach 45.72 cm.

The pattern is consistent: at Craftsman, bar length rises with the power source rather than within it. Wanting more than 30.48 cm means leaving the battery platform altogether — and the packs and charger bought with a cordless Craftsman carry over to no corded or petrol saw. Craftsman publishes little beyond bar length for these models, so no weight or power output is recorded for any of the fourteen.

Reading a Craftsman model number

Craftsman designations look inconsistent because they come from three separate product families, each with its own prefix. Read the prefix first; it is the only part that is reliable across the whole range.

CM opens every Craftsman power tool. What follows narrows it down:

• CMCCS — Craftsman Cordless Chain Saw. Sub-families add a letter: CMCCSL and CMCCSP are separate cordless lines, each with its own short-bar saw.
• CMECS — corded electric chainsaw, run from the mains.
• CMXGSAM — petrol. The digits that follow carry the engine size: CMXGSAMY42N6 and CMXGSAMY42N8 both record 42 cc, and both show 42 in the designation.

The suffix is the box, not the saw. A trailing B means bare tool — no battery, no charger. D1, M1 or P1 means a kit with a pack and charger included; the letter denotes which pack, the digit how many. CMCCS320B and CMCCS320D1 are the same 15.24 cm saw, and the database records identical specifications for both. The CMCCS610 and CMCCSL621 pairs work the same way.

That leaves only the middle digits doing any real work, and they run in catalogue order rather than encoding size: CMCCS320 carries a 15.24 cm bar while the higher-numbered CMCCS610 carries 25.4 cm.