New Cloyes stock Steel timing Chain TOO TIGHT!!

[OldGrayII]

Finally got around to installing this chain, Cloyes stock steel replacement, Part # C-3018, told them for a VIN 7 turbo, and its TOO TIGHT!!!! WTF!!! Theres no slack, I can force about an 1/8th inch MAYBE, and I haven't even put on the new tensioner yet!! What the hell????? This is Normal??????

 

[OldGrayII]

Guys????

 

[Chuck Leeper]

Cloyes fit

OG2, the 2000 cloyes catalog I have shows that number is correct for all 231 v-6's from 77 thru 87. It does NOT show a different # for the VIN 7 coded engine.
Addl. it shows the damper w/ spring to be 9-5158 and a GM # 25532546
The cam bumper is 905189 and the GM # is 25532588

The book shows cam gear as 40 teeth, the crank gear at 20 teeth and the chain at 54 links.
if you have an 1/8th play and the tensioner fits, I'd say that's pretty much what you needed.
Look on the chain and see if the #on it is C359. The cam gear is a S610T and the crank is S323.

HTH,

Chuck

 

[Turbo Brian]

The old chain had slack in it and it may take some slight tweaking of the cam and crank to get where the the dot and the tooth are in perfect alignment so the chain will slide on easily.

 

[Chuck Leeper]

TWEAKING??

The tweaking you refer to is most likely due to you setting the wornout set to match the marks when you took it apart.
You most likely will have to move either the crank or cam to get things lined up.
The movement just shows how far the cam was off vs new!!

 

[WarpSpeed]

If that chain's that tight on both sides, why use the tensioner? It surely isn't going to loosen up that much. The chain I put my GN, a speed pro unit I think, didn't require a tensioner, so I didn't use it..

 

[OldGrayII]

Chuck, thanks for the numbers, they DO all match. It IS tight, but I guess thats normal then, hmmmm.....Now as far as lining up the dots, I moved the balancer to the zero mark (white line on balancer) on the compression stroke, before I took it apart, thinking that this was TDC. Now I didn't look as I removed the old chain, but now the NEW sprockets dots are about 1 tooth off of lining-up. If I spin the motor slightly backwards, they'll line up perfectly. My question, I THOUGHT the 0 balancer mark on the compression stroke was TDC?? Why am I OFF a tooth????!!! Old chain & sprockets were in rather good shape so its not like it was slack that caused it.

 

[OldGrayII]

Just to clarify, If I spin the motor backwards just a hair, WITH THE NEW CHAIN ATTACHED, then the dots on the sprockets will line up perfectly! Were talking about spinnig it about 1/2 - 5/8ths of an inch. Could the motor have been THAT far off of TDC in only 60,000mi???

 

[Red Regal T]

If you can line up the dots perfectly, then the chain is on correctly.

 

[Steve Wood]

Yes, it could...

be sure the points on the two gears line up perfectly...

 

[TurboTA3.8]

if its a true roller its very tight to get on and you are supose to remove the tensioner

george

 

[OldGrayII]

I SHOULD have combined this with my other thread, anyhow...
TTT