Cam adjuster/chain question

[dsrtrat]

Last spring bike (1500 nomad) started making the typical cam chain noise. No biggie. Bought extenders and installed them. Front one has me concerned. I did not do the top dead centre trick but just installed them where engine stopped. Front one had a lot of pressure on it which i have had before. What concerns me is the chain guide was right tight against the hole. I have not seen that in the past. I was able to force it back in and reinstall the tensioner. Everything seemed to work fine. Then by end of summer i started to get a rattle in there again. I just fired the bike up the other day and it seemed to have either a rattle or a ticking sound. Whatever it was was rythmic and was metal tapping metal. I shut bike off and we did some work on it. I started it again later and it was gone. One thing i remembered from last fall was the sound i felt might be the chain didnt happen everytime i rode. It almost sounds like there is slack somehow and depending on where the pistons were on shutdown, it may sound different.

I'm wondering if this is even possible? Anyone ever have the chain guide that close to the tensioner hole? Could it be broken and out of position? Could the sound i am hearing be something else?