chain tensioners

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Bossed

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Hey fellas, new guy here. I bought a 2000 LS with a V8 for a $1,000. Beautiful car, really clean for a 10 year old car. It has a hurt motor, broken secondary timing chain. Today I bought another engine out of a 2002 with 60,000 miles on it. My question is can I replace the chain tensioners with the udated ones made of metal? Would I need to change anything else to make this upgrade? Would you guys recommend this? Thanks for your help, this website kicks ass!!! ;)
Bossed
 
If nothing else is harmed, I believe not. Someone may say secondary chain and that could be replaced but i have no clue if it's necessary..
 
part numbers change on 5/13/2001 to the new style. will they work???? numbers are still good and not superceeded so someone that has done it will have to guess.
 
part numbers change on 5/13/2001 to the new style. will they work???? numbers are still good and not superceeded so someone that has done it will have to guess.
 
Not to totally rain on your motor swap party, but how many miles are on the current motor? I mean one could repair the stock motor and resell that spare motor (or keep it around and drive the car like you stole it worry free) Pretty easily.

If the secondary chain tensioner is simply broke (car has a miss but will start and has a crazy loud rod knocking sound) then you only need to replace the $75 tensioner and it is a simple job if you ask me.

*Edit: One SHOULD replace ALL tensioners inside if one has already failed... but It is a gamble if not.

You would be saving yourself a great deal of work by just fixing the current motor and even if the chain did break and the valves hit the pistons there is still a chance you can just swap out the head without removing the motor as well.

I know SlickLS did this and he was lucky enough to not have to pull the motor as there was no piston damage.

Just sayin...

Nice deal either way! $1k and its clean... I like the sound of that!
 
I'm planning on the tensioner upgrade in a couple of weeks ('02 w/ 150k miles, considering it "maintenance") and will be using the metal ones. Nothing else required other than seals and such. If you're opening the engine - particularly on a stand where this will be ridiculously easy - then should also do the primary tensioners. The tensioners tend to be OK, but the long chain guides crack.
There may be PCM issues with swapping the '02 motor in, but hopefully not.
Agreed with others that a quick inspection of the '00 motor may be a good idea. It'd likely easier to pull a head and get a shop to repair it than to swap an entire motor. That way I can buy the '02 motor from you. :)
 
Hopefully he got the PCM with it.. Also, with the swap, I believe your going to have to take the car to a dealer so they can reprogram the PATS.. Unless the new engine will run on the old PCM which I have no clue there..
 
FASTLLS said:
Also, with the swap, I believe your going to have to take the car to a dealer so they can reprogram the PATS..
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the PATS is in the cluster, so as long as the engine computer is married to the car and cluster, the PATS should be good to go
 
FASTLLS said:
Hopefully he got the PCM with it.. Also, with the swap, I believe your going to have to take the car to a dealer so they can reprogram the PATS.. Unless the new engine will run on the old PCM which I have no clue there..
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A 2002 engine should run perfectly fine with a 2000 PCM. I wouldn't swap the PCM out.
 
Thanks guys, I ordered the chain tensioner upgrade kit from Christopher's foreign parts. The original motor has 150,000k on it. I pulled the passenger side valve cover and the secondary chain was broke. The cams are out of time, but damage is unknown without tearing into it. The 02 motor has 60,000 on it,so I figured it'd be alot more simple to change tensioners before putting it in the car. I'd like to drive this car for another 100,000 miles. I'm having someone swap the motors. ;)

Bossed
 
Bossed said:
Thanks guys, I ordered the chain tensioner upgrade kit from Christopher's foreign parts. The original motor has 150,000k on it. I pulled the passenger side valve cover and the secondary chain was broke. The cams are out of time, but damage is unknown without tearing into it. The 02 motor has 60,000 on it,so I figured it'd be alot more simple to change tensioners before putting it in the car. I'd like to drive this car for another 100,000 miles. I'm having someone swap the motors. ;)

Bossed
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Sounds like a winner to me!

How much are they charging you to do the swap... Just for my mental rolodex.
 
Bossed said:
Thanks guys, I ordered the chain tensioner upgrade kit from Christopher's foreign parts. The original motor has 150,000k on it. I pulled the passenger side valve cover and the secondary chain was broke. The cams are out of time, but damage is unknown without tearing into it. The 02 motor has 60,000 on it,so I figured it'd be alot more simple to change tensioners before putting it in the car. I'd like to drive this car for another 100,000 miles. I'm having someone swap the motors. ;)

Bossed
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is this a good upgrade kit? i wonder if this is worth doing before they do break
 
Bossed said:
Thanks guys, I ordered the chain tensioner upgrade kit from Christopher's foreign parts. The original motor has 150,000k on it. I pulled the passenger side valve cover and the secondary chain was broke. The cams are out of time, but damage is unknown without tearing into it. The 02 motor has 60,000 on it,so I figured it'd be alot more simple to change tensioners before putting it in the car. I'd like to drive this car for another 100,000 miles. I'm having someone swap the motors. ;)

Bossed
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If the secondary chain broke and the cams are out of time then the pistons hit some valves. I would remove the head on the side that you found the broken change and bring it to a machine shop to have it fixed. The LS motor is an interference motor. I highly suggest that you replace all the tensioners, guides, chains, and seals behind the timing cover. I did the same job about a year and a half ago. Pulled the head with the motor still in the car. Not too bad if you are good at working on cars.
 
Is it both the Gen 1 and Gen 2 vehicles that are prone to this?

Typically how much mileage on the vehicles before people have issues?
 
TooManyToys said:
Is it both the Gen 1 and Gen 2 vehicles that are prone to this?

Typically how much mileage on the vehicles before people have issues?
Click to expand...

Gen 1 and 2 use the same tensioner design, although the chains and sprockets are slightly different. 150k miles seems to be the trend, but will depend heavily on maintenance, driving style, max revs, etc. Some break before 100k, some have run fine at 200k.
 
SlickLS said:
If the secondary chain broke and the cams are out of time then the pistons hit some valves. I would remove the head on the side that you found the broken change and bring it to a machine shop to have it fixed. The LS motor is an interference motor. I highly suggest that you replace all the tensioners, guides, chains, and seals behind the timing cover. I did the same job about a year and a half ago. Pulled the head with the motor still in the car. Not too bad if you are good at working on cars.
Click to expand...

I'm not repairing the motor thats in the car. I'm replacing it with one thats got 60,000 miles on it. Before I swap them, I'm replacing the secondary chains and tensioners on the newer engine. Eventually, I plan to tear down the original engine and see what the damage is. :)
Bossed
 
Bossed said:
Thanks guys, I ordered the chain tensioner upgrade kit from Christopher's foreign parts. The original motor has 150,000k on it. I pulled the passenger side valve cover and the secondary chain was broke. The cams are out of time, but damage is unknown without tearing into it. The 02 motor has 60,000 on it,so I figured it'd be alot more simple to change tensioners before putting it in the car. I'd like to drive this car for another 100,000 miles. I'm having someone swap the motors. ;)

Bossed
Click to expand...

Tore into the 02 motor today, and to my surprise the tensioners on the engine looked just like the ones I bought to replace them with, metal :confused:.. I went ahead and changed em anyway, since I paid for new ones. :rolleyes:

Bossed
 
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