Ok folks, I know this is going to sound a bit odd but bare with me.

Around 6 months ago I had a JDM ITR Lump and LSD tranny fitted to my EK. All was well for around 1k miles until I developed a noise from the tranny, like a slipping belt only it went away once the clutch was depressed.

As predicted this was a failed bearing. Before I had time to pull the tranny the clutch began to randomly change its engagement point (It wasnt the master or slave cylinder at this point) When the tranny was finally pulled it appeared excessive heat had got into the clutch itself, the housing is the same colour as the plate shown in this picture ...

HTTP://www.endoffile.net/car_pics/clutch.jpg

Please excuse the size of the pic but it needed to be quite large to show the detail. Notice the purple and red colouring, that was apparently caused by heat.

I figured it was down to faulty parts (its happened before) and purchased an AP racing clutch as the exedys replacement.

I am now around 4k miles into the swap and the clutch appears to be slipping. I broke in both clutches for around 800 miles, very carefully I might add, and still appear to get probs. The AP is slipping when I do hill starts and if it doesnt slip it makes an awful stink trying to pull away at around 2k up a hill.

What the hell is going on folks ? Could it be a faulty transmission ? Has anyone ever had anything like this before ?

Any help would be really appreciated.

Cheers,

- Prob


Modified by Problemo at 12:35 AM 11/5/2005

 

Could also be how your using the clutch, aka burn outs, and poping the clutch can also do that if its escessive. I dont know how you drive so I cant rule that out, I've seen a few clutchs burned up like that.

 

I don't drive my car hard, and I haven't raced it since the conversion was done. I agree it can't be ruled out but I spoke to a number of people who say they haven't seen anything like this, even on cars which have had new clutches installed and nailed without even wearing the clutch in.

- Prob

 

get a kevlar clutch.

last clutch you'll ever have to buy. when it starts givign you ****, have the kevlar surface sand blasted. just like new!

i speak from experance and this thread:

ROCKET'S "CLUTCH 101" Article

 

thanks for the link great read

 

Thanks for the tip, I was just wondering why the hell my clutches are going bad so quick ? Are kevlar clutches street friendly ?

They do sound the dogs though

- Prob

 

Lets use some common sense here please...

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Problemo &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
As predicted this was a failed bearing. Before I had time to pull the tranny the clutch began to randomly change its engagement point (It wasnt the master or slave cylinder at this point) When the tranny was finally pulled it appeared excessive heat had got into the clutch itself, the housing is the same colour as the plate shown in this picture ... </TD></TR></TABLE>

Mistake number one. Your transmission basically "howls" at you and you do what? nothing and continue to drive. Now please don't come at me with one of those "but its my only car" excuses. It doesn't matter. If your car has something obviously wrong with it, such as a bearing making this much noise in the tranny, you stop driving it until you can fix it in order to spare yourself more costly repairs. It saves you nothing to continue to drive something into the ground.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Problemo &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Please excuse the size of the pic but it needed to be quite large to show the detail. Notice the purple and red colouring, that was apparently caused by heat.</TD></TR></TABLE>

The purple color, MAYBE, except most Exeddy clutches I have seen have that purple color to them right out of the box. The redness is from your failed input shaft bearing, nothing more, nothing less. You should have also noticed that the reness "wiped" off with your finger or a cloth. I've never seen "burnt" metal the just wipes off, have you? Also, why would just the spring area of the disc get hot? Simple answer, the color you see is not a result of exessive (or any) heat, Its the way the disc was since day one. Someone doesn't know what they are looking at and jumped to conclusions on this one.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Problemo &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I am now around 4k miles into the swap and the clutch appears to be slipping. I broke in both clutches for around 800 miles, very carefully I might add, and still appear to get probs. The AP is slipping when I do hill starts and if it doesnt slip it makes an awful stink trying to pull away at around 2k up a hill.</TD></TR></TABLE>

The smell is a result of clutch slippage. So you basically said "when it doesn't slip it slips". Makes no sense. Plain and simple, you have crap for a clutch right now. Its not the fault of your tranny, is the fault of your clutch setup. Most likely, specifically your pressure plate. Replace it with something a little better then an ebay special. You usually will get what you pay for. Exceptions are out there, yes, but its rare.


Edit: to make this real simple for you.

1). You drove on a severely 'wounded' transmission and wondered why it hosed your clutch
2). Your new clutch slips, most likely because of cheapness
3). Get it?

 

how's your pressure plate?

i know v-dubs have a lot of pressure plate problems with stock clutches and this is 99% of the time the way their clutches look...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ROK801 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
how's your pressure plate?

i know v-dubs have a lot of pressure plate problems with stock clutches and this is 99% of the time the way their clutches look... </TD></TR></TABLE>

Was it really needed to quote the picture? Tool.

 

Did you actually install this clutch yourself? That color is the same as the exedy I installed on my del sol last year.. it is not discolored by heat...

I think Hybrid93Eg is on the right track.

Edit:

ALSO, take a picture of that clutch from the side. If it is getting "eaten" it would be easly noticable with a picture from the side, would it not?

 

Theres no need to be a dick to the kid. Stop being an *** and just help him.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by nocturnaldragon &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Theres no need to be a dick to the kid. Stop being an *** and just help him.</TD></TR></TABLE>

I provided 10 times the help that your useless post gave. All his questions were answered by my single post. What again did you accomplish here?

 

Hybrid93Eg,

I appreciate your reply, you appear to have given me something to think about regarding the problems which I am currently experiencing. However, I feel I need to put some things right that I perhaps did not explain correctly.

Firstly, when I say the tranny was "finally" pulled, I mean after the car was driven back to somewhere the tranny could be pulled. Secondly, the vehicle was under warrenty of the people who did the swap, if the clutch/box/whatever is goosed what do I care, its their dollar.

As for the discolouration, yeah I jumped to a conclusion, I took someone elses word for it. I assumed them being the "experts" that heat did play a part in the damaging of the clutch, I am not a transmission expert, neither am I an automotive expert of any kind, I weld, I can change a head, I can undertake wiring, those are my limits, I guess I expect too much of people to know what the hell they are talking about.

Thirdly, you are jumping to the conclusion that the replacement clutch is an "ebay special" AP racing are a well respected company, who produce good quality clutch and brake kits, and as the UK is not exactly brimming with a wide selection of parts for these cars I figured they would be the ones to go for having used them and experienced no problems before, sometimes better the devil you know eh ?

Lastly, let me explain the clutch slipping scenario. What I was trying to say before the words escaped me was that the clutch appears to be slipping "easier" than it did before, I.e. low RPM hill starts. I am guessing this is the start of clutch failure but no doubt you will put me right.

I realise that I may have been sold a line, and now the vehicle is out of warrenty I am slowly finding out that yes, there could be a problem with the box, and this is what is causing the failures.

If this is the input bearing then at least I can correct the situation. This is why I posted, as I need others help in solving this problem.

The only thing I don't need is the attitude, yeah you know something I don't, and damn it must be frustrating to think that not everyone knows these things heaven knows in my job I feel the same.

The difference is I hold my nerve, I'm not a n00b, I am of reasonable intelligence and asked a valid question which was perhaps not explained 100% to your satisfaction, it's not like a repeat post, an invalid question or just something I couldn't be arsed to sort myself I'm just here looking for tech info before quite frankly I throw in the towl and get rid of the pile of crap, I've been quite patient with it up until now

Thats it really, once again cheers for your help, I will keep you folks posted when I eventually find the definite cause of my strange goings on.

Take it easy,

- Prob

 

Alright...I was a little harsh. I appologize. You post wasn't really all that clear. When you said you had a "failed bearing" I was assuming it was your input shaft bearing that was the source of the problem. Your description sounded a LOT like that was the problem when you say the noise went away when the clutch was depressed (pushed in). anyways...

When they "fixed" your problem, did they change out the clutch AND the pressure plate? Was the flywheel resurfaced? These are all critical things that could point the finger at the problem you are having. Sure, the clutch is a "well respected" brand, but that certainly doesn't rule out the occasional bad product. I would find out if the pressure plate and the disc were replaced and also if the flywheel was resurfaced. The flywheel is something you can sometimes get away without resurfacing, depeding on its condition. If the clutch is slipping right now, then you are on the right track in assuming its only going to get worse with time.

 

Hello there,

The place that changed the clutch, when they changed it, replaced the whole assembly, it was a 5 piece setup, the flywheel was skimmed and the whole lot put back together. I know this as I was there when they were putting it all back together. Not that I didn't trust them but I wanted to see what I was paying for.

Your right, it could be a bad product, but I get the feeling im the unluckiest guy in the world to have two bad clutch products in the same year both within less than 4k miles of them being installed.

I don't race my car hard and I don't reall ride the clutch in traffic so I dunno, I know people who treat there cars a lot worse than I treat mine.

The cars hopefully in tomorrow so they will be able to tell me for definite what the hell is going on.

Thanks for your reply !

- Prob

 

Well this thread is back from the dead ..

Having pulled the gearbox and clutch I can confirm the news is not good. The flywheel itself (which incidentally had been lightned) has warped, with three very obvious hot spots on it. The clutch is in a pretty bad way, the thrown out bearing collapsed after it was taken out.

My guess is the flywheel was over tightned or not tightned correctly, that or it was lightned badly or unevenly but I really am just guessing.

Whats your take on it folks ? Has anyone had any experience of this, I shall try and post pictures later as soon as they arrive.

Cheers,

- Prob

 

good luck with the clutch prob, ima need to replace mine in a couple of mounths just hopin i dont get the same prob