Hey Gang,

Thanks to all here, I got up the courage to dig into my 22RE and became the next one to replace the timing chain by himself. I ordered engnbldr's complete Front End Kit with a steel drivers side chain guide. I installed it this afternoon. I'm a bit nervous because it seems a bit "snug" against the drivers side chain guide. I'm afraid when I button it all up and turn the key, I'll hear metal on metal grinding. The "Shiny links" Line up with the dimple on the top of the cam gear and the dimple on the crank gear. There is a TINY BIT of slack on the chain on the drivers side but not much. Most of the slack is on the passenger/tensioner side where it should be. I tried pushing the steel guide as far away from the chain as possible before bolting it on.. but still seems to touch. I was thinking of drilling out the bolt holes a bit more to give a small gap between the chain and guide. E-mailed engnbldr.. awaiting a response. I wanted your feedback as well. I know some are not big fans of the steel guides to begin with. Thanks all !

 

When I pulled off the original plastic drivers side chain guide, the top bracket had broken away from the bolt. After this happened, its possible the guide pulled itself away from the chain, thus creating a gap between itself and the chain. Maybe the guide is SUPPOSED to be right up against the chain ? When I first saw it, I saw a gap so I assumed a gap was the norm. I could be wrong.

 

It looks fine how it is in your pictures. If there was a gap then the chain would slap around and accelerate wear as well as make the cam timing (and thus the ignition timing) erratic. I don't have a picture of mine when I assembled it with the LCE metal backed guides, but I would have no worries running it how it looks in your picture.

 

Thanks Arlindsay. I also heard back from Ted at Engnbldr who said this was normal as well. The links will wear a "track" into the rubber lining to keep it from flopping around. I just wanted to make sure before I buttoned it all up.