My two pennnies
I haven't posted anything on this site in a long time, but feel compelled to write a little something at least regarding chain drive vs gear drive cams. My intention is not to offend anyone here, and obviously everyone is entitled to their opinions. Regardless of the type of tensioner used (spring, hydraulic, etc), staying with a chain drive setup almost always eventually results in some form of premature wear. Roller chains would probably have a longer lifespan. The material used for the stock spring loaded tensioners that Harley used on the TC88's between 2002-2006 was terrible. I know quite a few people that have had problems with those tensioners wearing out too early (some in as little as 20k miles or less) while others may get 30k-40k miles out of them. I had a personal friend....who purely by a miracle I believe, didn't trash his motor on a softail standard when we found that the tensioners were all but completely worn thru and almost split in two when he decided to go with a gear drive setup. His bike had 35k miles on it at the time.
I have been running some form of a gear drive cams for years in my '04 Roadking, and they are by far the best design choice out there....regardless of who you go with. Cam bearings last longer, and the cams are MUCH easier to turn making less work for the motor....ie...free horsepower. You can go as high as a 585 Easy Start from S&S without having to use compression releases. I have those in my motor, which is now a custom built 106 Cu Inch Stroker, with mostly S&S internal components, Fueling oil pump, cam plate and lifters, S&S Roller Rockers, Zipper's Throttle Body and intake with Zipper's Stage 3 heads, Vance & Hines 2 into 1, and a Thundermax ECM. This setup is phenominal with huge power gains, and finally, my bike feels like it has the power it was supposed to have from the beginning.
I'm all about saving money, don't get me wrong, but when it comes to my Harley, I would rather invest in good quality parts, knowing that I'll get years of use out of them. It's like everything else out there, you get what you pay for. There is tons of info out there on this subject, so research it a little, and I believe you'll probably come to very similar conclusions, and to those who are still skeptical, I have another friend who's motor just got lunched....34k miles on it..and the tensioners went out while riding. That's going to be a little more expensive to fix now.