I still think you were in 5th gear. [sm=smiley36.gif]

 

yeah i dont get the low power part either, but it was definetly a little sluggish

i will prolly break 19K miles this weekend on the bike.......since i had to adjust the chain almost all the way to the max to get it within spec i am thinking me needs a new one soon, or maybe i will go with that open belt drive i have been eyeing up

 

i'll do better than that, meet up with me in NJ and you can buy me a beer. errrrrr.... i mean i'll buy you a beer

LOL

 

Hmmm...THAT would be a heck of a ride from Nebraska!

 

He's a cheapskate,he's counting on it being too long a ride for you pryone free beer out of him.




J/K But I still don't see how you can be down onpower from a loose primary chain. If it was a cam drive chain I could see the enginedoing wierd and strange things, and even causing it to pop out of gear from the missfires. But a primary chain doesn't, or at least it shouldn'thave any direct effecton overall engine performance. Something very strange going on here.

 

Had a problem like that on an Ironhead. It had lost the nylon shoe on the primary tensioner and it had wedged between the chain and the case. Since this was an early one that had to have the pimary opened up to adjust the tension, the problem was obvious. Since he says that the adjustment is maxed out, he could have something like that going on.

 

It does not have any effect on enging performance however, the primary chain transfers power from the motor to the gear box. An impropertly adjusted chain will reduce the amount of power transmitted through the gear box to your rear wheel. If you can picture a belt and pully arrangement, when the belt gets loose the driven pully will slow down in relation to the drive pully. If the belt gets real loose, it won't even turn the driven pully.

 

Geoseismic,
I think you missunderstood my question, I understand and fully appreciate how the system works better than you think. My question was in relation tohow it affected his perception of delivered power.

The jerky operation, and inability to deliver power smoothy are common symtoms of a loose chain condition.
Unless thechain wasway over tightened inducinglarge amounts of parasitic drag I still don't get thelowered power output.

The onlylogical explination I can come up with is that it DID NOT actually affect the true power output of the engine. The loose chain induced jerky operation just disguised that fact.

Aloose chainis unable totransmitpower smoothy unless or until itwas placed into a continuous load condition great enough to hold the chain in a constant state of tension. Such as accellerating from a light or cruising at speed down the highway.
When it isn't under a continuous load (as in lowspeed manuvers) it gives the "missimpression" that the engine is down on power. It isn't really down on powerit just requires more than normalthrottle settings to generate the tension required toprevent or limitthe chains erratic flopping motion.

 

both you guys pretty much summed it up!

thats exactly the way it was acting