What is a realistic lifespan for a CB500/550 camchain?

[Seabeowner]

The aftermarket chains are crap that Sliver sells as a OEM replacement and the Honda ones are £££

I've used genuine Kawasaki primary chains (fitted to the K400/4 and the 550 zephyr I think) on a couple of 500/550s. The zephyr develops more power than the Hondas so should be good. Got them less than half the Honda price.
And always thought the 500 camchain mechanism was better than the 400/4 with that auto tensioner that didn't work well and the damage to the horseshoe caused by worn chain.

[deltarider]

And always thought the 500 camchain mechanism was better than the 400/4 with that auto tensioner that didn't work well and the damage to the horseshoe caused by worn chain.

I've always wondered if prolonged inactivity plays a role here. One can't blame Honda for having a blind spot for that typical western phenomenon: the winterstop. BTW, I had another look at the maintenance schedule in the CB650 owner's manual. Quite frankly the "A" (adjust) interval for the camchain every 4000 mi. (6400km) interval leaves me puzzled...

[Pangloss]

There is an alternative if you are prepared to make a small change to the bolt hole in the barrel. (Elongate it by about 4mm..
Benelli 500/654 tensioner. I took this one from my benelli .It's done 29000 miles...looks fine..
Much simpler...doesn't require adjustment.

[hairygit]

Surely it would be easier to adapt the carrier rather than the barrels. Looking at it I'd imagine it wouldn't be hard.

How are you supposed to take tension off the chain for removal and fitting BTW

Let's be sensible here guys, would you REALLY want to risk putting a shoddy Italian copy of an engine part into a beautiful Honda engine???
No way on earth I would!

Sent from my POT-LX1 using Tapatalk

[deltarider]

There is an alternative if you are prepared to make a small change to the bolt hole in the barrel. (Elongate it by about 4mm..
Benelli 500/654 tensioner. I took this one from my benelli .It's done 29000 miles...looks fine..
Much simpler...doesn't require adjustment.

This is the kind of post I was hoping for. So do I understand it was auto-adjusting? There must be a way to improve that tensioner. Had a look at the manual. https://www.manualslib.com/manual/1050473/Benelli-500-Quattro.html#product-750 Sei P.26 shows something but not much. Lets await other ideas. Hairygrit, you can't be serious. The north of Italy is known worldwide for its excellent industrial engineers.

[Trigger]

You started this thread 2 weeks ago so, in that time you should of had the motor out and changed all the parts that needed to be replaced and the bike should be back on the road ! But, i don't think you have done anything apart from tap a keyboard so, your chain can not be that critical 

[deltarider]

Trigger, what never stops to amaze me, is how different experiences are in various sites and I'm constantly aware of echoing. Just today I reread the CB500 and CB550 rider's reports, published long time ago, compiled by many Dutch owners. Most complains will be familiar: oil pressure switches, oil leaking at the head, ignition's susceptibility to moisture, the plugcaps in particular, but nobody has had to replace the primary chain. When you look at the number of riders and the miles they did, it's good statistic material and it tells you a lot about what one can expect and what not, enabling you then to compare that with what you learn here, the French, the German and in the international site. In my archives there's also an article about a Dutch teacher who back then has bought his CB500 new and with just regular maintenance in 20 years, using it as a daily rider to go to work, winter and summer has done 220.000 kms without the block ever been opened. He confessed he seldomly went over 6000 rpm. Whereas where you are, it seems a lot of diving into gearboxes is going on. Believe me, nobody (well not many) does that here. So perceptions differ and when I now have to invest another time to have the 3rd (!) tensioner fitted, it is reasonable that I want to find out: a. did I do something wrong? b. what others experiences are. I am flabberghasted what others in the international site think they need to repair and maybe, one rainy day, I will compile a list of things that sofar I NOT had to do.
My clutch pushrod? Never been a problem. Jumping out of 3rd or any gear? Never happened. Never had to replace a fork seal. You might say: what did I do wrong? On the other hand I'm impressed how many miles the Americans do with their secundary drive chain. Mine had to be replaced every 15.000 km. So I think it is always good to exchange experiences. Today I've read some real good advice on compression test, what you can expect and what not. It's on the German site and I will translate it when we have a rainy day.
If all this sounds like a complaint to you, I humbly apologise. It could well be you've seen it all. I am just an amateur.

[Trigger]

You can not say it is down to different countries as, I have engines in from all European countries, the USA, Canada and Australia for re builds but, never had one in from Japanese customer yet    99% of engines arrive to me via courier in a crate and I never meet  most of my customer apart from trade shows or events.  It is down to different riders and the way use the bike 

[Bryanj]

Delta, the only way an owner would know about the primary chain is if they know exactly where to feel with the sump off OR where to look when the cases are split for some other reason. I have just had the sump off a 50000 mile engine and the wear is significant with a feelably loose chain.

[Trigger]

Same as they didnt put a new chain in the cx500 tensioner mod kit so you ended up doing them again at about 30000

I was always surprised how the CX chain stretched so fast being a HI-Vo and short at 78 links 

[Bryanj]

Well ive been using it for years but then i did sail with chinese crew who used englishish

[K2-K6]

Is "Feelably" actually a word?

wasn't that one of the tellitubbies?  Or that's what they called him behind his back, although not proven through legal process 

[K2-K6]

"In my archives there's also an article about a Dutch teacher who back then has bought his CB500 new and with just regular maintenance in 20 years, using it as a daily rider to go to work, winter and summer has done 220.000 kms without the block ever been opened. He confessed he seldomly went over 6000 rpm"

This illustrates that mileage as an absolute basis for judging the chain life has potentially large error.  The only consistent accurate way at technical level is to count crankshaft revolutions.  Chain life at average of 4,500rpm v the same at 7,500rpm will clearly reach the same wear point at very different mileage totals.

There doesn't appear to be any problems with "tensioner" units in quality or design.  It's secondary, as if the chain didn't wear, then the adjustment likewise wouldn't have to move.

Any improvements would come from preventing the chain from wearing at the same rate,  that would be either material specifically in the chain bearings or a change in lubricant that would better support the chain bearings.

[robvangulik]

This illustrates that mileage as an absolute basis for judging the chain life has potentially large error.  The only consistent accurate way at technical level is to count crankshaft revolutions.  Chain life at average of 4,500rpm v the same at 7,500rpm will clearly reach the same wear point at very different mileage totals.

That doesn't work either, when riding in the same gear your distance per revolution will be (approx) be the same at high and low revs, just in a shorter time frame

[K2-K6]

You're right robvangulik,  but it's because I've used rpm to describe engine revs of which the "m" is time component.

The correct technical / grammatical description to describe the chain's life would be engine revs in total accumulation,  just that we reference them as "rpm" because our usual indicator,  the tachometer says that.

To clarify,  chain life should be consistent and measurable to reasonable accuracy in total cycles or accumulated crankshaft revolutions.