I put a Haden M6 on my 1997 Heritage in 1997. I never had a problem with it. It has over 180,00 miles on the M6. I did have to keep adding shims over the years to make up for chain streaching, Finally replaced chain and back to few shims. Same shoe. Once it grooves- it stops wearing any further.

 

I don't know if this will answer your question or not. It's probably more than you asked, but here's what I came up with.

In order to measure pounds of force on the chain tensioner, I removed it from the bike and set it on a scale. I then used shims of know thickness to place between the shoe and the mounting bracket but not under the springs. I would then push down on the shoe until it contacted the shim I was using and I recorded the reading on the scale at that point to the nearest 5 pounds. I checked every thickness several times to get the most accurate reading I could. Not a perfect method but I'm sure it's close.

With the springs at rest, the gap between the shoe and the mounting bracket is 5/8". I then went to 1/2" all the way to zero ( the shoe contacting the mounting bracket) in 1/16" increments. Here are the results.

5/8" - 0lbs.
1/2" - 15lbs.
7/16" - 25lbs.
3/8" - 30lbs.
5/16" - 35lbs.
1/4" - 50lbs.
3/16" - 60lbs.
1/8" - 75lbs.
1/16" - 85lbs.
0" - 90lbs.

I then placed the figures on a graph to better visualize the relationship between spring compression and pounds of force. I noticed that it's not far off from being linear so I drew a dashed straight line from the start point to the end point just to reflect that it is close to linear.

I don't know if this answers your question. I got a little carried away.

 

I liked hayden alot compared to the stock. lot of good years with it. Then a spring broke and was going to replace the spring but just went with the attitude adjuster instead,just gettin tired of runnin in circles.

you will like it

 

Very cool test.... thanks for the info and taking the time to compile it....

 

Absolutely, you're spot on.
My setup produces only 37 Kg* (75lbs) after recessing /repair of the shoe because I had to remove about 1/16" of material where the springs rest inside the shoe. There was a mess inside the spring well: springs were not concentrically seated and would rub once compressed

The inner spring is the stiffest one. If you use only the outer spring once fully compressed you will have the force specified by chain manufacturers for our primary chain. Not more than 25 lbs* is the magic number!

A simplistic way to evaluate the force is to calculate how much weight/mass of chain our engine can spool per second, every second, at maximum speed (6,000 rpm).
The statement about more horsepower calling for stiffer springs is true because you spool chain quicker until the specified force is reached.
Horsepower concerns the upper segment of our chain, the lower segment just carries a mass of chain through a path that dampens the decatenation wave (as the chain leaves the driving sprocket). Then shoe takes over to position the chain where it will not be stretched as it is grabbed by the teeth of the driven sprocket.
When you decelerate as the lower segment stretches the shoe comes down and it's spring force doesn't stress the rest of the transmission.
Only harsh downshifting is not welcome with this setup.

 

UPDATE.
I finally put some miles on the bike. It's been a slow start this year but I finally put on a few miles. I have just short of 500 miles on the Hyden primary chain tensioner. It never did get very noisy. The shoe shows only a minimal wear and it seems to work fine. So far so good. For whatever reason it does make neutral a little easier to find. Here's a video I made of my 500 mile inspection.

 

All I can say is good luck. For me it was the single most expensive POS I ever installed.

 

Really appreciate your time and video. I too have this tensioner and have had zero issues. I look forward to updates and will post my results next time I get in the primary.

 

Your welcome. I was hoping I wasn't wasting my time other than for my own benefit. Next time I'm in my primary I'll post what I see.

 

Had one in my 2013 FLTRU for 4k miles, the noise was unbearable, put the stock tensioner back in. I contacted Hayden about the "new" springs and a new shoe back in late 2014. Only heard from them once and that's their customer service. Like someone else said most expensive POS I've put on any of my HD's.