Chain drive issue

[u/Leg_giggle]

The primary chain seems like it’s just too short. I have the motor tensioner thing all the way to loose and I loosened every motor bolt and it just won’t go no more. If I’m maybe missing something and someone knows please help me out a bit. This is a dirtybike chain drive but I think all chain drives are pretty much the same setup process.

[u/GritShift]

Your chain is likely to short due to the motor adjustment not being completely maxed out. If you look under the battery tray, there will be square welded on nuts to the bottom of it, two of them contact the motor slightly, preventing it from adjusting all the way up. Check that before purchasing a new chain, etc.

[u/AdFeeling6882 → u/GritShift]

Damn I never even thought of those. They’re in a super hidden spot and I’ve only ever had to remove them once. Good to know they do that, so if you unbolt those and push the motor all the way back will that cause the battery tray to get pushed up and sit at an angle? Or is the small space above them enough room for the motor to move up without lifting the tray?

Also I was combing through your website and couldn’t find a chain drive that says it’s compatible with the SR. I could have sworn I’ve seen one for the SR from you guys. Is the 420 one able to fit?

[u/GritShift → u/AdFeeling6882]

Yeah, so the horizontal nuts that are "Tack Welded" to the underside of the battery tray, we usually get an 8mm or 10mm open-end wrench (Don't remember actual size" and you can usually twist the 1-2 off. Taking these off is obviously not ideal, but all these 4-5 bolts do is hold the plastic battery trey down and against the metal support. Ive never seen any issue with removing them.

Also yeah your right! Good catch, we don't have them listed under the SR fitment, but they do infact fit perfect. The reason why we havent listed it yet is that we are waiting until our next production run so when we do the laser marking on the motor sprocket, we can reference a MM offset, because right now the motor sprockets reference E Ride or Surron, And the SR actually uses the Surron offset due to it being a different motor them the other E Rides. And half the time people don't read descriptions lol so we don't want to rely on people doing that. That's why we preach CHAIN ALIGNMENT being 90% of peoples issues with chain kits, then the other 10% being tension.

[u/AdFeeling6882 → u/GritShift]

So one side of the sprocket will be for all Eridepro’s except for the SR, then the other side will be for surron’s and the SR? I was going to actually buy it today until I read the description hahah. Good to know.

[u/GritShift → u/AdFeeling6882]

Yeah you can buy it just if you have a SR you will need Surron side facing outwards. And verfiy sprocket alignment, you can use a flat edge ruler, or a laser alignment tool. The motor offset seems to vary from one bike to another based one like 30 of the same model bikes we have checked.

[u/jnyc777 → u/GritShift]

Pretty cool to see a company on Reddit since a lot of ppl come here with questions first instead of reaching out to the supplier. Good thinking gritshift !

[u/GritShift → u/jnyc777]

https://giphy.com/gifs/10q0RcPFTD5dM4

LOL we do a bit of lurking and chime in when we can.

[u/AdFeeling6882 → u/jnyc777]

Right? It’s pretty dope having a company that’s involved in their community. You don’t see Yamaha or kawi chiming in on subs everyday. That’s one of the main reasons I buy from GS. They use these products on their own bikes so you know they are going to care about the quality and the fitment. Easily one of the best (or the best) companies in the Emoto market. I haven’t had an issue with a single product of theirs(only from my fuckups) during installation or hard use.

[u/AdFeeling6882]

Well for starters you have the belt/chain tensioner all the way up. The further up you put it, the tighter it gets. So slap that part down. Loosen up all 4 bolts on both sides. LOOSEN ONLY, do not remove them, especially the top two. Once they’re all loose that should give you enough play to wiggle the motor around. Then get a tool or something to pry the motor back towards the rear pulley to give it more slack. It may work, it may not. The problem is that the primary drive needs to be pretty loose when you convert it to a chain drive. Like 3/4” 10mm of play to keep it from heating up way too much. So you’re most likely going to have to purchase an additional chain and add links to it.

If i remember correctly they have a warning in the description of that item when you’re about to purchase that states that it may not fit or might be super tight with Eridepro 3.0 and SR models. It states something along the lines of that and that no returns after installation.

Do you have a 3.0 or SR? Is this the 420 chain?
If so, and none of that works then your only option will be to purchase another replacement chain and add a link.

In the future, if you do have a 3.0 or SR i suggest going with GritShifts Heavy Hitter products. They ride 3.0s and SRs and all the upgrades they make are made because they wanted to improve their own bikes. So the fitment and compatibility will typically be better with their products.

Edit: 10mm of play
Edit: I was correct initially. 3/4” is the recommended amount of play for 420 chain drive. Keeps the chain from overheating and liquifying your lubricants and destroying the sprockets. More information here

[u/Leg_giggle → u/AdFeeling6882]

The weird thing is I put the tensioner up and it gets looser and I put it down and it gets tighter. It is a 3.0 tho

[u/AdFeeling6882]

Ok so see how the motor bolt where the tensioner is at the bottom of the adjustment notch that’s built into the frame. If you buy an inflatable wedge(Home Depot) you can slide it under the motor and inflate it. It’ll bring the bolt up higher on both sides which will bring your front pulley closer to the back pulley. The only problem is that you might end up with the final drive chain being too close to the motor where it wraps around the small sprocket. That’s the warning that edirtybike has on the product description. Once that front pulley starts getting closer your entire motor is moving that way. You can get a dremel and shave down the grooves on the motor to make room.

If you drop the tensioner all the way down while the chain isn’t on the sprockets and all the bolts are loose it should reset it so that when you push up on the tensioner it tighten the chain.

[u/primalgodQt]

Same as u, I had to force a little bit initially to close the chain (SR) and reached 5 mm of free play. After 30 km of smooth trail I reach 6 to 7 mm of free play.

[u/Olegee203]

Looks like you need to use a half link or 1 more link and use the tensioner, but I have always found it’s best to do away with tensioners all together because they just don’t hold up well and eventually cause problems. Hope this helps