Lost slack in cam chain?

Ok, so I was putting some new shims in my valves today and as soon as I pulled the idle sprocket off I suddenly lost all the slack in the chain. I then took the tensioner out, but still no avail. I rotated the engine to see if I could get the chain to slacken back up, but no avail. My problem is that there is not enough slack in the chain to seat both cams. Why would I not have enough slack in the chain to put the cams back? Any help would be appreciated.

sounds like the timing chain might have came off the crank.

so I probably just need to keep jiggling it to get it back on?

ya

and make sure you get your crank back in time.

The old Z's almost have to be straight up and down. If you have a leaning side stand, that can be enough to have the chain slip sideways off the crank gear. Once to get chain aligned correctly, insert exhaust cam first keeping chain tight and so on.....