Posted: May 09 2011 at 3:35pm | IP Logged

As you know from an earlier post, the dealer told me that I needed these replaced.  They arwe doing them today and I stopped by to talk to the mechanic.  Truck is an 07 Cre Cab 4WD with about 36,000 miles on it.  Always ran on Mobil 1 5W30 which was changed every 3500 or so miles with a new filter.  Everything was as clean inside the front cover as though it was new.  No sludge or varnish at all.  The drivers sdie tensioner was cut all the way through and the passenger side was cut about 2/3 of the way through.  The replacements look just a tad different but only a tad.  They are snow white; the ones being removed are orangeish but that could be due to time, temperature and oil exposure.

So...using only high end synthetic oil did not deter this wearing of the tensioners.  Moderate driving habits (I'm 63) did not help.  Turns out my truck has the lowest miles on it of any where this dealer has replaced the tensioners.  They just did one with over 110,000 miles.

So here's hoping the new ones wear better than the old ones. This is being covered by the power train warranty, BTW.

Posted: May 17 2011 at 5:35pm | IP Logged

Got my truck back from the dealer today.  When I originally posted, they had the cover off and the tensioners out.  They had the parts come in only to find that a chain guide had a broken end.  They ordered that and it came in about two days ago.  Finally got the truck buttoned up and running.

It runs a LOT quiter.  I had not really noticed how much noise was coming from the front of the engine.  The mechanic said most people don't as it comes on gradually and you get used to it.  I want to compliment the dealer here in State College for doing a fine job on fixing it and having the patience to deal with a customer who really needed his truck back.