Fellows, I'm fairly new here, and new to HD. Been riding metric for a while but just bought a 2000 FLHTCI. It has 28000 miles and I'm told always been run with HD syn oil. My concern is with the cam chain tensioners, since I've read they usually need to be replaced around 30000 miles. Guess I have a couple of questions since I'm not sure what I should do:

1. Should I take the bike to my local HD dealer to have it inspected and/or tensioners changed? Should I also get the chain replaced?
2. Should I consider changing to gears instead of the tensioner (don't fully understand this, but seems like what others are doing)? If so, what do I need to do?

I hate to spend a ton of more money on this bike, but I want to take care of it and don't want to break down far from home.

Is any of this work something I could do myself if I'm good mechanically? Besides getting a service manual, what else would I need?

I'd really appreciate your advise as to what I should do.

Jim

 

I would check the tensioners or get the dealer to. You may not need them yet, so why spend the money on gear drive unless you need too.

Joe

 

Any idea what it will cost for me to have the dealer just replace the tensioners? Doesn't look like to big of a job, although the inside tensioner could be more of a challenge.

 

Mine went 44,000 miles but it was the inside shoe that wore out, not the outside one. Unfortunately, pieces of the shoe found their way into the oil pump so that had to be replaced as well.

Replacement means at least cutting out the one piece pushrods and replacing them with adjustables ($180), two new cam chains since you are already in there, the two shoes, and possible a cam if it is worn beyond specs. About $800-900 complete. The oil pump adds about $280, plus stuff like a new filter and oil.

Geared replacements are about $1400 complete, but that is from memory, could be less. Chains are quieter but then you got to do the replacement thing again in 30-40,000 miles.[:@]

 

I'm doing my own cam swap to gears for about $800 not including the PCIII that I have to buy.

 

There are a few specialty tools you need to do a cam swap, but they can be rented instead of bought. I rented a set of tools for three weeks the winter before last and it only cost me about $40.00.

The actual work of switching over from the stock cams to geared cams is a piece of cake with the correct tools and your service manual...plus the instructions that come with the gear drive cams. I just had my local HD shop do the presswork; as far as pressing the cams and bearings into the cam support plate. They charged me like $30.00 for that, plus the $40.00 for tool rental, and finally, I was able to buy a complete gear drive setup with cams, gears, bearings, and gasket for about $550.00 from www.directparts.com

So I had my gear drives done for about $600.00.

 

Thanks everyone for the good info. I picked up a service manual yesterday, and I've got to say it's an excellent manual. I've been riding a metric bike, and surprisingly it's service manual is much less helpful.

Goodbirds said he went 44,000 miles before he had to replace his tensioners. How many miles has everyone else gone? Did you use dino oil or synthetic?

Thanks again. Gives me a good idea of what I've got ahead of me.

 

Congrats on your new bike, Taterdog (great name, BTW). I got my 2000 FLHTCI new, and that was 71,000 miles ago. I've had a lot of bikes, this one is by far the most enjoyable.
You're right about the manual; it's as good as they get. It's thorough and hasn't been translated from Japanese, so you don't have to worry about translation errors. As you become familiar with the bike, you'll find that it's fairly easy to work on. Unlike many metrics, you can actually access the areas you want to work on. Unlike metric dealers, which are really parts ordering centers, you'll also find that most HD dealers stock most parts.

The useful life of the tensioner shoes is really a crap shoot. Some seem to go early, but I know of one guy who has over 100,000 miles on the originals. I consider them a wear item, and I remove the cam cover every now and then and have a look. If you want do it once and forget about it, changing to gear driven cams is the way to go. If you decide to do this, make sure the cams you select will work with your current build as well as any upgrade you might be contemplating.

But there is also another potential issue with your bike. During the 2000 model year, HD went to a re-designed inner cam bearing because the earlier design had exhibited a tendency to disintegrate. A lot of people thought HD should've done a recall, but instead they issued a five year, 50,000 mile transferable warranty. Obviously, this is of no help to you now. I don't know if it's still possible or not, but you used to be able to go to the HD website and find the build date of your bike. That way you'd know which bearings you had. If you have the older style bearings and they haven't been replaced, you may as well consider swapping cams and switching to gear drives now.

As far as doing the work goes, I personally think you're always better doing it yourself so long as your comfortable with it. If you're not, and it may be a little early in your case, consider finding a good independent to do the work. Dealers are SO expensive, and the work quality varies a lot. If you're really ambitious, there's a guy named Harleyhog who has a wonderful website who describes how to swap cams with few or no special tools using only a kitchen over and a freezer. I haven't tried this myself, but I think I might. He also used to publish every service bulletin the motor company issued---until they found out about it.

Good luck with your bike. Since mine is also a 2000, I'd be happy to help you with whatever issues you have so you don't have to repeat any of my mistakes.

Uncle Peepers

 

Thanks, Uncle Peepers, just the info I was hoping to get. Sounds like you've had a lot of good experience with your bike. I hadn't heard about the inner cam bearing problem, but I'll go to the HD website to see if I can find out about what I've got.

If I do happen to have the old style and need to go ahead and replace the bearing and change tensioners to gear type, is there a type of gear tensioners I should look into?

Also, your suggestion to go to an independent is on target with the advice I've been getting from a friend with an 05 Classic. His bike is still under warranty, but once that's gone he plans to go back to a good independent close to where he lives. Unfortunately it's a long way from where I live, so will need to look closer by.

Since you've got the same bike, I probably will be contacting you as I get into things further. I really appreciate the offer.

Jim

 

Glad to help, Tater. Right now I think you may have a few apples in you orange basket. Let's try to straighten things out. Currently, the cams in your bike are driven by a chain. The chain is kept taught by means of two plastic tensioner shoes; these are the items that wear because of their continued pressure against the chain. On the other hand, gear driven cams, as the name says, are turned by a gear on the end of the camshaft. Since there's no chain or tensioner, there is basically nothing to wear out. Harley does not make gear-driven cams because someone else holds the patent, and HD won't pay the asking price for the license. There are a number of good after-market cams out there; Andrews is one manufacturer that comes to miind. Switching to gears makes things easier in the long run; the downside is that the upfront expense is more.

The bearing issue was a matter of one of the bearings simply not being up to the job. Not all of them disintegrated, but enough did that it became an issue. If your inner cam bearing is one of the suspect ones and hasn't been changed, you should change it or have it changed while the cams are out. You can buy the bearing individually or HD sells a kit for this purpose.

If you elect to stay with chain drive for now, I personally think that the later manufacturered tensioner shoes are of a touger material than the earlier ones, although HD had never indicated a change. 07's have a completely different tensioner design and chain, so I'm not even considering that.

Hope this helps.

Uncle Peepers