I have 47,000 miles on my 04 Dyna Lowrider and several people have told me that if I don't replace the guides on my cam chain tensioners that they will break off and damage my engine. Just wondering how may of you didn't do this and caused damage to your engine. And if so, what was the miles on your bike when this occured?

Thanks,
Jokester

 

Can't give you an exact answer but I'll say this.
You are probably on borrowed time. Many shoes are shot at 30,000.

 

I had to have mine replaced at 43,000 and I also wound up having to replace the oil pump cause it had the plastic all in the pump, wound up costing $1500. I actually had stopped riding cause the whirring sound wasn't right and they said good thing I did cause it would have caused metal bits to go into the engine.

 

I did pull off the Cam Cover and opened the tensioner, the groove is only as deep as your fingernail is thick. The one on the back side looks to be about the same, you can see it through the top. I would say the 80% of my miles are freeway miles. I have talked to several people and they stated that due to there city driving that they ride it hard from light to light and that is what wears that plastic slider out. So I made out today. I replaced the clutch cable that was broke at the adjusting nut at the front of the frame and checked my cam chain tensioners. I was really bummed out, I was looking forward to putting in a hotter cam. That's OK, I do have the stage 1 Eagle set up and it does very well on the power side, once it hits 3.4K RPMs.

 

I've got 42,000 miles on my '06 RK Classic and will be inspecting/changing my tensioners in the next few weeks...

As with anything, there are people on each end of the extreme. Some here would have you believe you are pushing your luck if don't change the tensioners prior to the first ride home from the dealer. Others will quote hundreds of thousands of miles without trouble. I'm putting my money somewhere in between.

The tensioners were about $65 each for HD parts. I'm electing to change mine since I'm going through the trouble of pulling parts off and opening up the engine. Remember, you might also want to change the black plastic chain guide and the several O-rings in/around the oil pump... I'm also switching to adjustable pushrods during the process.

The whole "while you're in there" thing gets more expensive and complex the more I think about it...

Edmo

 

Here are my stock tensioners after 42,200 miles...

The depth of of wear isn't very much, but you can see the pits starting to form in the surface. These would have lasted for quite a few more miles. Guestimates vary, but at least another 20,000 is my guess. However, peace of mind is a good thing!

Edmo