'84 720 tk series, 2.4 L T-Chain Probs

HELP!!! I am going to skip some of the long story, but my p.u. has about 250,000 mi. on it. I have all new timing chain parts,grs, tensioner, guides. It doesn't stay in time while I crank it without the cover on it. I am not used to overheads with a long chain. Can this be happening because the oil pump drive, oil thrower and balancer and bolt are not there to keep crank gear in place?

Count the chain links to make sure the new one isn't too long. Have you already pull the release pin on the take-up plunger?

Sorry. Part of me was just being stupid I guess. I was thinking that the same marked links on the chain would match up to the marks on my gears whebn at TDC. Anyway, now that I have had a chance and it is not raining, sleeting, snowing on me I have checked and the sprockets do come "up" like they are supposed to. I also timed my pump as shown in Chilton resources. Back together and it still doesn't seem to have compression, but i do get an occasional backfire. .....I will try to start at the beginning since I know some information that has not been mentioned yet.
First I must say that I am posting because I am either overlooking something simple and I am too involved and obsessed to see what someone "outside" will see.
Also, I am new to the area, have very limited resources and funds (that's an understatement!) am on a hill, not in a shop, trying to salvage time from off-work time after using it up on bussing, to work on this in whatever weather I get. So lets not get into the high tech diagnostic tools. I pulled the front pulley/balancer off with puller I made...
So anyway: I had replaced the timing gears and chain about 30,000 miles ago. No problem. Last summer (over a year ago) I had a water problem, it got hot-- extremely hot. Head had to be milled. I had been fighting different things so I was thoroughly disguted and very impatient at the time. When reinstalling the head, instead of taking the timing cover off, I used some very strong prying / jacking techniques to get my cam gear back on the shaft. In hindsight this must have bent/kinked the tensioner/guides and possibly the chain itself. It seemed okay obviously for about 18,000 miles. There was a new oil appearance/blowby in vac line and aircleaner, but I rationalized it was perhaps valve guides or something from when it got hot. I also was unsure about some of my vac lines. Anyway, things were obviously going smooth enough to where I felt confident to move from Ks. to Mn.!!! I had a noise that I thought was the throwout bearibg , then I thought it was the front trans. bearing and after taking the trans out, found out it was something with the O.D./Rev shaft. I was having no luck with finding info/help with the tranny and totally fed up with having to take a bus everywhere and the extra time it consumed, so I put the damaged tranny back in, deciding to keep it in the firat 4 gears where it operated reasonably smooth. Taking it out and putting it back in by myself is a good little job for this skinny (125lb) guy so you can imagine that I was really fed up with the bussing thing. Anyway, I through that in because there was "some" noise going on when I had my engine problem. Which is to say it just stopped. I was going 20-30 mph. and???? I clutched it and pulled over. I can't say if there was a noise or not.
Anyway, when I pulled the pan and timing cover, my chain was actually at times locking up on a piece of guide stuck between the sprocket and chain. Another couple og hunks of guide were in the pan and the chain was in a twist. Before getting this far I had feared a twisted crank because i have had one in a Ford that actually ran. But even now, when I back the front pulley up a bit and barely touch the starter there is immediate thrust in the front also. And when I had the pan off, nothibg seemed "amiss" there.

So, anyway, does anybody see something here that I don't. My compression tester is in storage in Ks. and I keep saying to get another one, but if the cam gear mark is straight up once to every time the crank gear mark is straight up, how can it not have compression. Did all the valves go bad and rings disappear at the same time....So I keep going back to the crank.....

If by "marks", you mean the marks used to set up the chain ... well, I'm not sure they should be "up" at the same time. Maybe, ... I've just never looked at it that way to see.

I do know the crankshaft keyway should be pointing upward when the camshaft keyway is pointing upward.

Yeah, teh marks are at about 2:00 and 4:00 but the crank key and the cam Hole/pin are straight up. Valves 1,2,4 & 6 are closed, which is compression for #1 cyl. Actually I'm going by the cam mark and keyway more because when it is right (pin/heyhole up and punchmark #2 at 2:00) it is on compression for #1. Valves 3,5,7 & 8 are closed when #4 cyl. is @TDC. I may try pouring some oil in the cyl. plug holes and seeing if that makes a difference

By the way, my Hanes manual, is also in storage in Ks, but the library here in Duluth has an excellent Chilton's electronic reference which has all this information and printable diagrams.

The chain has two links which are either totally black or totally shiny which stand out from the other links and which mesh with the teeth on the gears that are marked. The crank gear has a dot on a tooth which is in a 4:00 position at TDC and the cam gear has a no 1, 2, & 3 dot on it and at TDC the special link meshes with the tooth marked with the # 2 and it is in about a 2:00 position. This is the way I put it in when I replaced the set. This is the way I timed it when I replaced the blown head gasket. This is the way I timed it after having the head milled. Each time after I timed it and reassembly it ran.

Did you pull, and discard, the release pin that came in the tensioner device?

The crank position and cam position are both coming back to TDC correctly , so the tensioner is working correctly. There is no release pin. You assemle the plunger and spring in the housing as you install it.

As to my original post, I was mistakenly thinking the chain and marked links would be in the same position @TDC in relation to the marks on the gears. There are 40 teeth on the cam gear, 20 teeth on the crank, and 106 links in the chain so obviously they wouldn't. There are 39 links between the marked links, and at any TDC the number of links between the marks on the cam and crank gear remains 19.

If when the crank and cam are at TDC, ... is the distributor rotor pointing at the #1 spark terminal?

Yes, the dist. is at # 1. I started to reply before. Like your obviously thinking with the cam gear key "up" when the crank is TDC the dist. is the only way to be 180 off. If the valve train were off the key would be down on the cam gear.

No. Like i already said, every time the CAMSHAFT makes a full turn, the Crankshaft turns twice.