Argo chains

[kolody]

hello everyone. New user and bigginer user for Argo. Just bought my first one a few days ago. Its an Argo conquest 20hp. I noticed well going threw it that the chains are a little loose on the one side. Can a person take a link out on it or would that mess up the way the other side would work. And do you have to use Argo style tires on it or can normal style quad tires work. Would it still float with quad tires? Mine has the stock tires on it now and id like to put some taller tires on for some better ground clearance.

[Mike]

Hi kolody, welcome to the site. Your Argo will float with any tires you choose however only a few tires will actually propel you forward in the water and those are typically tires with V tread. Look in the tire forum to see what others are running. As for the chains, you should jack the machine up in the air to check the tension. On the ground, one chain may appear to be tight or loose when it is fine. This is from the chains being tight on the side that is pulling the chain and loose on the return side. Also, you should have chain tensioners that can be adjusted to take up the slack. You don't want to remove a link as that will eventually cause premature sprocket wear. If you run out of adjustment with the chain tensioner you should replace the chain.

[Noel Woods]

I agree with Mike based upon my experience with chains. You want to keep equal chain length on each side and removing a link from one or both sides is not a fix, it places more stress on the rest of the driveline (sprockets, bearings, other chain, etc.).
I have had a chain break in the field however, and you can use a chain breaker to remove a link or two then use another master link to short chain your machine into operation to get it back to base. I liken this to having a flat on your automobile and using the space saver tire to get to a tire shop. Its a temporary fix only. Welcome to the site and I hope you get to enjoy the machine to its full potential.

[kolody]

Thanks for the reply. There is a spring style tightener on all the chains. Its a 1998 model. I can't see a way to adjust it anymore than it is so I put a stronger spring on it and it seemed to tighten it right up. As I said...pretty new to this stuff so I really have no clue except for basic sense on the machine. I'm sure the way to go would ve to replace all not there till next payday. so I'm not sure if I should run the machine ir wait to replace all the chains. Is there another way to adjust the chains besides the spring adjusters? And as well I noticed that the sprockets slide back and forth on the driveshafts. Are they supposed to be that way or should they be tightened up lined in with the front one? Again thanks for the help

[JohnF]

Welcome to the site Kolody. You are the very first beginner to visit!
Just kidding

Put some sort of indication of where you are located in your profile. This way some of the folks on the site that live near you can help out with rigging up the tire setup for the stuff you'll be riding in. If you just want more clearance then in the upper right put "Frontier tire conquest" into the search box, hit enter, and read about putting the 24" frontier tires on the conquest.

Mine is a '97 and pretty much the same. Start out like Mike said, jack it up so that all the tires are off the ground because everyone wants to know if your bearings are good. (Well, I wonder...) Then you can get a feel for the chain wear. And about the chain; the pitch of the chain exactly matches the pitch of the sprockets. As the chain wears (sometimes called "stretches") its pitch changes. This then works to wear the sprockets. My point being that if your chain is wore out then change it before you have to replace sprockets too. Removing a link probably means that you need new chain. (my experience for the best deal is to watch ebay for double 50 roller chain)

I bet the slider blocks on your tensioners are splayed apart. Those sliders are supposed to be parallel to each other but over time the spring tension twists the arms. The trick here is to take the tensioner apart and swap the top and bottom arms so that they are splayed the other way - longer on the spring side. Just leave it like that and eventually over time it will pass through parallel on it way to being twisted the other way.

and again

Oops - had to come back. On mine, the sprockets float on the front axles and the idler shafts. The rest are held by set screws.