Chain Rail Replacement

[husafreak]

No, with a flashlight and keen eyes you should be able to see how many holes are showing. The skewer was mostly to show how the holes are at a difficult angle to view, and they may be filled with oil. and it is jet black in there. So with the combination of the skewer and my eyes I was pretty confident that I needed to order a two hole chain rail.
Now I am waiting on the tool I bought for the drive belt replacement. It comes from Germany (BMW part) and the shop said it could take as much as 6 weeks. When I get it I will do a major maintenance session. I'm in Livermore BTW, Go Sharks!

 

[C650GTInTheSun]

No, with a flashlight and keen eyes you should be able to see how many holes are showing. The skewer was mostly to show how the holes are at a difficult angle to view, and they may be filled with oil. and it is jet black in there. So with the combination of the skewer and my eyes I was pretty confident that I needed to order a two hole chain rail.
Now I am waiting on the tool I bought for the drive belt replacement. It comes from Germany (BMW part) and the shop said it could take as much as 6 weeks. When I get it I will do a major maintenance session. I'm in Livermore BTW, Go Sharks!

Thanks so much for the quick reply! I took another look and can't for the life of me find those holes visually.i can't feel them with a tool either. I'll regroup and try again later.

I did have a chance to see how much slack is in the chain. Below are pictures of the upper and lower limit of the slack, and also where it "lands" naturally. I'm guessing this amount of slack indicates that this job is in my future?

Thank you again for the help and go sharks!

 

[husafreak]

Your chain appears to have even more play than mine, so I would say yes you need the next step chain rail. But I am no expert! I am under the impression that the BMW window is there so a shop mechanic can see the chain and if it can be forced above the arrow then he would drain the chain oil and remove the entire side cover, easily count the holes, and grab a new part off the shelf.
If you look at @Delray pics in post 5 you can really see where the holes are on the chain rail, and how hard they are to see, and that you can barely see them and be sure with a skewer tip at an angle through the chain slack viewing cover on the swingers.
It is surprising to me how little slack is allowed, compared to how much is allowed on bikes with exposed chains like dirt bikes and my Tenere.
FWIW Calmoto ordered my part and had it in less than a week.

 

[C650GTInTheSun]

Your chain appears to have even more play than mine, so I would say yes you need the next step chain rail. But I am no expert! I am under the impression that the BMW window is there so a shop mechanic can see the chain and if it can be forced above the arrow then he would drain the chain oil and remove the entire side cover, easily count the holes, and grab a new part off the shelf.
If you look at @Delray pics in post 5 you can really see where the holes are on the chain rail, and how hard they are to see, and that you can barely see them and be sure with a skewer tip at an angle through the chain slack viewing cover on the swingers.
It is surprising to me how little slack is allowed, compared to how much is allowed on bikes with exposed chains like dirt bikes and my Tenere.
FWIW Calmoto ordered my part and had it in less than a week.

I got the trusty borescope camera out. I see this dot in the pictures below, that seems to line up with the picture in @Delray s post. Is this what I'm looking at? And if so it's a stage 1 and I need to jump up to a stage 2?

Also, when you did yours were you able to salvage and reuse the gasket for the final drive cover?

Thank you again!