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Phil, the noise IS the chain hitting the case. There will be noise of course from the chain itself but it's running in a bath of oil so any noise it makes is muted by that oil. The reason the noise goes away when it's in gear is because when in neutral the chain is not under any load so it lashes around, as soon as you select a gear the chain now has to pull the gearbox shafts and the rest of the clutch around as well and that tightens it up enough for the chain to stop hitting anything. You see the same effect on the rear chain, accelerate and it goes rigid, roll off the throttle and you can see the chain go slacker.Replace the primary drive rubbers as well when you replace the chain or it will have a much shorter life.At the moment the damage it is doing is fairly minimal, if it was really bad you'd be seeing little flecks of alloy in the oil, however it does need doing sooner rather than later, maybe a job for the winter
The question was do I have to take the engine out of the frame or can I just take the cover off without removing it?