So my bike has recently turned 12k miles and it's started to have a rattle around 5-7k rpms. I thought of course that it was the cctl but when I called and talked with a local motorcycle mechanic for a quote on it he said that its probably not the tensioner but the cam chain itself and he swore by it... I'm not sure what to think now. Am I right thinking its the cctl?

 

its always a possibility that it could be worn... but for a tech to just straight to the chain with the known issues with CCT on F4i's i would get another opinion someone that will look at it before they call it bad.

 

You don't have that many miles on it, change the cctl and should be good.
It's easy to do, I don't know what a shop will charge but you can get an oem
one for about $75. Only took me 45 min to change it, took longer to get to it
than replace it.

 

Without being there, it's hard to do an accurate diagnosis.
However cam damage is extremely rare, especially given the miles listed.

I imagine the mechanic is refering to cam/valve adjustment.
Which is possibly due as scheduled maintenance at that mileage.
However, I don't see that as causing the noise described.

If you're going to refer to someone local to diagnose/fix the issue,
I'd get a couple of opinions, as mentioned above, by another poster.

The CCt replacement is a cheap/easy job, and certainly won't hurt
either you budget or the bike to do as a step in correcting/diagnosing the issue.
If you choose to DIY.

Ern