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This weekend, I took the chest cover off and here's what I found. I've taken to checking about every other oil change or ~ 8000 miles.
The inner tensioner seems to have more wear than the outer. Not sure if that's normal, but so far I think they're still serviceable for a while.
I notice that these are kind of a gray color. Most of the replacements are ?white? does one brand work a lot better than the other?
I realize I probably should eventually upgrade, but at least for now, I'm just being very careful to keep up with the wear.
58k miles (picked up this bike at 50k, and checked the first day (!))
There is no upgrade unless you change the cams since the inner sprocket keeps the link chain. The upgrade is the roller chain. Once it wears in, it rolls and ceases to wear.
Never seen gray unless they are the white ones that have age hardened from hot oil.
Are they original. What year and model.
The OEM are orange. The aftermarket are white but you need to reuse and basically rebuild them.
Last edited by Jackie Paper; Nov 19, 2022 at 08:05 PM.
At some point, your bike has had the tensioner pads changed out... I don't recognize that brand of tensioner pad. They aren't the Cyco brand pads that I've used on one of my bikes, and others have had used with better wear than OEM pads........
AT 58K miles, that is not a lot of wear. Either your pads were changed shortly before you bought it at 50K miles, or they are wearing well...
Here's a pic of OEM tensioners that are worn, heavily pitted, and one is moments from failing...
Here are a set I took out of a bike I recently bought that had 10K miles and were 19 years old. The wear is minimal, but I didn't like the pitting. IMHO, that suggests the tensioner pads are getting brittle. I believe that can lead to a failure just like ones that are heavily worn... I was in there and replaced them with Cyco pads since I don't put a lot of mileage on that bike..
Last edited by hattitude; Nov 19, 2022 at 10:23 PM.
Thanks everyone for your posts... Yes I'm sure they were changed somewhat recently. Checked them at 50k and haven't seen much change at 58k.. at least for now I'll just keep checking them every other oil change. At least now I have some pix to compare with next time... the first time I didn't take any pix - which I regret.
One of these days I'll put in a new set of tensioners, and I'll use the cyco pads as suggested.
Thanks everyone for your posts... Yes I'm sure they were changed somewhat recently. Checked them at 50k and haven't seen much change at 58k.. at least for now I'll just keep checking them every other oil change. At least now I have some pix to compare with next time... the first time I didn't take any pix - which I regret.
One of these days I'll put in a new set of tensioners, and I'll use the cyco pads as suggested.
BTW it's a 2000 FLHT (the one in my signature)
I agree, looks like a more recent replacement due to minimal wear/grooving at that mileage and pad color which is yet to be identified . Remember to change out at least the rear bearings when you decide to pull the plate for the pad/tensioner replacement. That may have been done when these pads were replaced but don't leave that to chance.
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another cam tensioner thread
