The tensioner on the passenger side takes about 7 minutes to change
The drivers side you have to remove the thermo housing and upper intake plenum so that one takes about an hour
So an hour an 7 minutes and you can install two new ford tensioners, the life
Blood of a good running sohc engine
The two hydraulic chain tensioners fail due to lack of clean synthetic oil changes or higher miles. The moment you hear a timing cassette tick or cold start rattle is the same moment you should realize it is time to change the tensioners out.the cold start rattle is the engine starting with no tension on the chains which is what eats the nylon guides and is the beginning of the end. Putting a new tensioner in avoids that “slack out of time” condition and keeps the nylon guides together
I have never seen a sohc engine fail for anything other then timing issues. If people would be aware of the tensioners they could get twice the lifespan from their sohc
Ford tensioners are expensive
I will only install ford
or
stainless manual tensioners from eBay meant for a Polaris engine (bit derived from a ford part)
You should do a little reading on this!!
@allmyEXes listened to advice and now he has been running the $50 manual tensioners for a long time
I have saved so many sohc engines by replacing bad tensioners
Also most timing issues can be solved through the front timing cover. The main tensioner, the balance shaft and front cassette can all be changed/serviced /!repaired without removing the engine it is only the rear cassette on the passenger head that requires removal of the engine
As soon as you hear the tick time for fresh tensioners and fresh oil. I will only run full synthetic Mobil one in a sohc engine and change it every 3500-5000 miles