Well just to anyone who may be interested,
On Saturday i replaced my upper timing chain and tensionser on my vr.
I did not change the lower one because it only runs an intermediate shaft and should not be as abused as the upper one. But anyway after chaging the upper chain and tensioner i started and i was so relieved it started and the noise was completely gone!
I did this in 4 hours (inc tea breaks) and parts only cost me:
Genuine upper chain and tensioner: £75 inc vat (i got top guide rail aswell but didnt fit)
And to save stripping down the box etc i ordered a genuine mercedes timing chain split link which i know is the exact same size as the vr's single upper chain. Which cost me £1.85 inc. vat.
I took off all parts needed to take of rocker cover, so off came inlet manifold etc, and took the rocker cover off.
Then put some plastic bags under the cam spockets and got the grinder out and ground one link, them used a punch and hammer to take the link out,
I got out the led line light and had a look at the guide rails which werent broken at 149866 miles! So i was so lucky otherwise i would of had to do it the hard way because i would of changed these if needed!
Then i got an assembley link and attached the new chain to the old one. And as i turned the crank by hand a friend kept tension on the chain and we had to keep turning the cams to alloy the intermediate shaft to turn, we did this untill the new one was down and back up again then we removed the old chain and set the cam timing as it should have been. Then using the mercedes split link attached the back together.
Just thought someone may be interested, i havnt included much detail but if anyone is interested in doing it give me a shout as its so easy this way and has solved the problem i had!!
