TOPIC:

Not too sure if this tensioner gear is good or not. I haven't found many examples online of new OEM gears but have found examples of much worse off ones than mine. The bike (1982) has 13000 miles on it and it has the stock tensioner (soon to be replaced). Thanks for the help!

Other than the slight grooves from the chain it doesn't look particularly worn to my eyes. I just looked at my new one and it looks much the same.

I would not change that now.

I would give it another 10k miles maximum.

The secret is to keep you oil and coolant topped up so the engine runs as cool as possible.
The real wear issues start when the plastic gear gets too hot and goes soft and then they wear more.

Pete F
UK

This is a pic of a brand new tensioner wheel:



And this is a pic of mine at 35,000 miles before I replaced it:



On that basis I would say yours is fine & is showing minimal wear

I agree it looks fine to me, 13K is not that far for these to go, its got a lot of life left.


Apparently there are two versions of this part made by Kawasaki, the later version looks identical but they improved the plastic composition. These run much longer than the early type did. I don't know when they made the new part available or when they started using the updated part on production bikes.

Thanks y'all and thanks for the picture of the new one too. Now I have a baseline to look at. I just don't want to mess up my dream bike! So when the gear wears and the tensioner moves in to take up slack, does the rubber roller wear as well? I'm just surprised that the wear of the gear would slacken the cam chain at all. Doesnt' seem like a large change in diameter is possible.