Greetings,

There seems to be some confusiuon with some people I have spoken to regards timing chain types employed on the late production run of the AJ27 engine.

AFIK...the AJ27 was always fitted with single row chains.
The Reynolds heavy duty single row roller chain was fitted for both primary and secondary use.
The last run of engines was fitted with the Morse stlyle of multi plate chain (still single row) and sprockets of which the design was carried over to the X350.

Some one said to me that the last of the X308's employed the double row chain know as a 'Duplex' chain....similar to what was fitted to the earlier XK engines.
To clear up this matter can some one enlighten me to the facts please.

 

My 98 was single row.

 

Thanks Vancouver....yes, I am a ware that '98's have single row and I am pretty sure after doing some exhaustive research that ALL X308 engines retained the single row row chains with the last production numbers of the AJ27 engine converting to single row Morse style chains and sprockets which were carried over to the X350.
I have yet to find any information that says otherwise....uinless somebody can inform me of this. ;o]

 

Max:
I don't know if the term "single row" really applies to a Morse style chain. I guess you could say the Morse style chain picture on the right had many "rows" couldn't you? The other one is a double row roller chain.

 

Ross, yes, if you wish to be pedantic, a Morse chain is made up of several 'rows' of links and basically varies in width according to the load it is designed to handle.
After spending 38 years in the printing industry and running Rockwell Goss presses, they used Morse Hy-Vo chains....as did Honda in their first CB -750 4 motorcycle in 1968
GM also uased these chains in the drive for their FWD Pontiacs.
I am well aware of what 'Duplex' roller chain is as used in the XK engines from 1948-1986.
These were also used in the AJ6 and AJ16 engine families for the X300.
But from what I can work out the X308 engine family always used single row roller chains or the equivalent Morse chains in the last production numbers.

http://www.pbase.com/padme002/image/155506537

http://www.pbase.com/padme002/image/155506539

 

Max:
The second picture has the image of the morse style chain that looks like the primary chain in my MY 02 XJ8, built in Sept. 2001, and owned by my wife since new.. The other image looks like the roller style chain in either of my XJRs. All of the cars had roller chain for the secondary chain, but the MY 02 came with metal bodied secondary tensioners. I happily do not know what primary tensioners it has!