Small block question. Anyone use the

Does any one use the 3.9 timing chain tensioner on their smallblock V8? I have two here. Redoing a 408 stroker with a 220ish @ 0.050 cam.

I’m race only but I would rather and do spend a little extra for a quality chain and never bother with them.

I ran one on my LA 360 for a number of years. No issues...

They work great. Some will say the double roller spines will gouge the teflon slippers though, I have not had that issue. Run a stronger 'silent' chain with the smooth back and they will get your timing rock solid. Getting a quality chain may not prevent it from sagging after 10k. Look at all of them after you remove the timing cover.

OK, I will be prep'ing one. I drilled a 3/32" hole in the right lifter gallery core plug right behind the cam retainer plate and will drill a bigger one in the tensioner so oil will feed the chain better. Ive done this on a few smallblock engines.

These Magnum blocks main bearing feeds are already drilled out bigger than the Herb McClandless spec's of 9/32".

they are 5/16" from the right lifter gallery feed down to the main bearings. And all but one of the oil holes from the oil pump mount up to the 90 degree over to the oil filter plate are drilled at 1/2 inch, BUT the return from the filter was only 7/16" and VERRRRY rough, looks like what is left over when a drill breaks off while boring. NASTY.
I drilled it out to 1/2" and it is now a clean bore.
I am using the Magnum 6 hole oil filter plate but drilled the 6 holes from 1/4" out to 13/32" , Just because I can.

My 5.9 Magnumn block has a Production date stamp of 24708 and "Hecho en Mexico" . I thought that the 5.9 stopped in 2003.

I ran one for 2-3 years. It broke and the flat spring tried to eat its way out through the timing cover. I put the best timing set on I can find and thats it.

I run a tensioner on my dailydriven 360.
I ran fine emery paper for awhile along the outside of the timing chain to break any sharp edges that might be there.

I bought and ran that tensioner in my Magnum based 408. It seems to work well, but it is really just a chain guide. Once the side plates of the chain links cut through the nylon, the rollers roll down the nylon with little to no wear on the nylon block.

The best trick I've found to keep my timing chains tight is to soak them on their side in quality synthetic gear oil.

I stumbled across just how good of a break in lubricant that stuff is when I ran out of chainsaw bar & chain oil one time. I substituted Redline synthetic gear oil in my saw and the life of my chains more than quadrupled. It was nothing short of amazing.

Started soaking my timing chains in it, and it has virtually eliminated any chain stretch in half a dozen of my motors so far. The results are remarkable.I also use the highest quality timing sets available. .

That is probably the best advice I've seen regarding timing chain stretch

This makes me wonder, is a roller cam vs a FT easier on a timing chain and/or require less lubrication?

If the roller cam had the exact same lobes as the FT and required springrate, I would say yes.
But usually a roller cam (in our applications) means a performance upgrade by using larger and 'quicker' lobes, needing bigger spring rates, putting some more rotating force on the camshaft.

Stock 318 and 360 LA roller cams are pretty much just roller versions of the FT cams they came with originally.

Don't think timing chain life noticed the difference.

Thanks for all the replies above. Wish we had a "LIKE" button on here.

Since I am using a 5.9 magnum block and a roller cam that is a step above a 340 Resto cam it should not be adding a lot more force on the cam gear. With 410 ci (4.040 Bore and 4.0 Stroke) I picked a Luniti Voodoo roller 219/227 @0.050 and 0.549/0.565 @ 1.6:1 rockers. Should have a nice rumble out of the two STACK's of my LRT.

The Edelbrock aluminum heads I got from Mancini are horrible right out of the box. Core shift on the exhaust ports makes it hard to gasket match but I was able to get them very close with just a little gasket sticking in the stream on 1 port on each head. Then the casting flash and boogers in the ports and the hardened valve seats have a huge step on the intakes that I had to blend down. And the oil drain back holes are small too. I am not doing a race port job on these, just a good cleaning of flash and boogers and a little blending in the pockets.

The timing chain tensioner is like I said, drilled so oil pressure from the right lifter gallery can force feed oil to the chain. All the oil passages are larger than a stock LA smallblock and I am using a blueprinted Melling 572 High volume pump. After my first oil change I am adding a dual oil filter set up but one of the filters will be a restrictive flow 2 micron bypass filter that feeds back to the timing chain cover adding more "SUPER CLEAN" oil to the chain area.

I'll concur that a pre-soak will extend chain life. My old company used modified double roller and silent chains for conveyance sections in the larger assembly machine. We did studies on different chains, material, and process and the pre-soak was a significant increase in usable chain life. Think how long it would take oil to make it's way into those roller as that chain is spinning around after a dry start on a new build. It's not running in a bath.

I've just installed the tensioner on my new 410 sb, using a ProGear Hughes timing chain setup (that shouldn't make any difference). Looking at the front of the engine, I observed the lower left corner of the tensioner was making contact with the installed SLINGER PLATE! So, I carefully masked and ground away some extra clearance at the area ... using a Dremel tool and small grinder.. ground away about 1/8" from lower corner of the tensioner so that it clears the SLINGER... if it wasn't ground for the clearance, then the SLINGER would've been at a slight angle when the balancer would press against it... not good.

This is all good information. Thanks y'all.

I use to take half a tube of 'White Lithium' assembly lube and mixed it 50/50 with 10W30 and painted parts and soaked the lifters and chain in it too. There a lot more assembly lubes out there today.