Chain vs Gear Drive

09ultra 

So when is it worth it to do the upgrade to gear driven cams? I have 14K on my 05 Deluxe. I have a 95" kit due to the fact the MoCo had to upgrade my valve stem seals and I got the labor for free. I was uninformed and had the HD stock 95" with the 204 cams. No head work done as i was not really up on my options at the time. Also no adjustable push rods were used. My question is with where I am at, what and when should I do what? What gear driven cams, should I do head work, how many mile until I should worry about the tensioners? I had one local wrench tell me the life of the tensioners seem to vary due to the polishing quality of the chain? True or maybe just a theory? Thanks.

glider 

Whew, so many questions an so little time

Depends on what you want out of the motor. If you want more dependability, go gears. Any run out in the shaft and they can be noisy. The 204 cams raise the power band more so than the 203 which is a mild cam for chains and would be a bit easier on them besides lowering the power curve down a bit to the more usable area. Many choices here depending on what you are looking to do.
The push rods can be done at any time when and if you decide to change cams, otherwise there's nothing wrong with the stock pushrods. Again what you want out of the engine will depend on head work or not. It's a plus to have a good porting job and bigger valves when this is done and the engine will respond nicely to it but remember to do the whole package like the proper headwork, springs, deck height, squish for the cams you choose. It all has to work together or all you end up with is parts that don't work well together.

Tensioners, I would check every 20-25K miles or so, the polished chains will definitely help on the wear factor, the info you got was true.Even the second set of tensioners with the original chain unpolished will go a bit further than the original ones.