padam
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What is the thickness of that flywheel?
Throwout bearing touching fingers.
- Thread starter TallGuy71
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Most are 1", not sure where this 1.25 unit came from...
TallGuy71
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Originally a 4 spd car.
If my experience with McLeod diaphragm clutches carries over, the pressure plate fingers need to move about 3/4 to 7/8” for clean shifting. Add something for free throw and you are looking at about 1” for TO bearing travel. You can bench assemble the flywheel, disc and pressure plate on the bench and measure the stack height from the flywheel-crank flange to the fingers. Then mount the bell housing with a couple of bolts on the engine and measure the bell housing effective from the crank flange to the transmission-bell housing face. Subtract the first from the second and you have the distance from the clutch fingers to the face of the transmission. Then you can play with the TO bearing dimension and TO bearing retainer dimensions and see how much room is left for TO bearing travel - it needs to be around that 1 inch or more to include some free play.
The 1.25” flywheel versus more typical 1” thick flywheel may be the problem but there could be some other issues too.
On GM cars I usually use an adjustable height fork ball pivot to optimize the fork position and travel. I guess on a Mopar you can do the same to some extent with shims under the pivot. All aftermarket manufactured clutch’s height and flywheel thicknesses vary all over the place. You can’t count on any of it to be a duplicate of the OEM pieces anymore. And going from a B&B to a diaphragm pressure plate adds to this, although it can be adapted. For this reason it’s always a good idea to do a lot of trial mockup with clutch, flywheel, fork, TO Bearing and linkage install on the bench and then the engine before trying to mount the transmission.
The 1.25” flywheel versus more typical 1” thick flywheel may be the problem but there could be some other issues too.
On GM cars I usually use an adjustable height fork ball pivot to optimize the fork position and travel. I guess on a Mopar you can do the same to some extent with shims under the pivot. All aftermarket manufactured clutch’s height and flywheel thicknesses vary all over the place. You can’t count on any of it to be a duplicate of the OEM pieces anymore. And going from a B&B to a diaphragm pressure plate adds to this, although it can be adapted. For this reason it’s always a good idea to do a lot of trial mockup with clutch, flywheel, fork, TO Bearing and linkage install on the bench and then the engine before trying to mount the transmission.
TallGuy71
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It has the Sixpack damper so it probably has the heavy rods... I have seen guys drill the backside of the damper to create a zero balance damper that still looks like the Sixpack damper but I doubt that's the case...
And why would someone do that you ask? Because the Sixpack rods are heavy... But still use the same bolts as an LY rod... The bolts break more often than the beam portion of the rod... So all the Sixpack rods do is increase the bob weight of the engine & cause it to rev slower...
Properly massaged LY rods are lighter & equally strong, the aftermarket offers rods that are stronger with bigger bolts... So there are reasons to do it, but keeping the Sixpack damper completes the "look"
And why would someone do that you ask? Because the Sixpack rods are heavy... But still use the same bolts as an LY rod... The bolts break more often than the beam portion of the rod... So all the Sixpack rods do is increase the bob weight of the engine & cause it to rev slower...
Properly massaged LY rods are lighter & equally strong, the aftermarket offers rods that are stronger with bigger bolts... So there are reasons to do it, but keeping the Sixpack damper completes the "look"
Daves69
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Orig69
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It's looking good so far, because the flywheel is missing a tooth you should have some good pictures they can tell you what the flywheel needs and if it's the correct flywheel.
Medium duty truck application?
TallGuy71
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I was told that some of the Brewers people are in this group and I could tag them to bring them in. I don’t want to do that and bring them in on their time off, but if anyone is close to them and thinks that they’d be interested to help before the shop opens back up on the 5th please let them know they could shoot me a DM. This thread has been an awesome learning experience for me and my dad, we’re thankful for the community.
TallGuy71
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I’m away from the car for the next few days but I can try and measure this when I get back to it.
dcala84141
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U hit the nail on the head with your post
My 68 RR originally had a borg and beck pressure plate and cast flywheel and bell housing 11” clutch. Over the years the whole set-up was changed to a steel flywheel, diaphram clutch, Lakewood scattershield this through the whole clutch geometry off causing going through two diaphram pressure plates turns out the steel flywheel was thinner than the stock one, the Lakewood fork pivot bracket height was a quarter inch off. Fiqured this out buy measuring the heights between the stock setup and the after market setup as you posted
PRHeads
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No help from me on this one, but wanted to comment on what a good thread this is.
Looking forward to seeing what the main problem turns out to be.
Looking forward to seeing what the main problem turns out to be.
I’m in the middle of putting a new clutch in my 66 Satellite with a Hemi. The flywheel and bellhousing are correct originals and I’m using a McLeod Street Pro clutch and 2” throw out bearing. I fixed a somewhat tweaked spring on the fork, that otherwise looks good, by drilling out the rivets, straightening the spring retainer and securing it back with small bolts/red Loctite, after tapping the fork. The flywheel and pressure plate are at the machine shop being balanced currently.
When I get them back I’ll degree in the bell-housing to confirm it is OK and then trial assemble everything and check fork position and where the back of the TOB is in relation to the rear bellhousing surface. The fork outer end needs to be clear of the front of the bell housing opening with some gap and have plenty of room for traveling to the rear when the clutch is pushed in. Some gap to the BH opening edge needs to exist up front as the clutch fingers move out to the rear as the disc wears which moves the outer fork position forward, so some room needs to be left for this. If the fork position doesn’t look good, something will need to be changed in the TOB length or shimming the fork pivot.
Then I’ll check that dimension out on the transmission input and see if it looks good for position and room for some free play. My old TO Bearing measured 2.1” long with a Chinese diaphragm clutch. So I’m hoping McLeod has that scienced out with the 2” one they provided. If not I may be back to sourcing another 1.7” TO Bearing. Hopefully it all comes together OK.
When I get them back I’ll degree in the bell-housing to confirm it is OK and then trial assemble everything and check fork position and where the back of the TOB is in relation to the rear bellhousing surface. The fork outer end needs to be clear of the front of the bell housing opening with some gap and have plenty of room for traveling to the rear when the clutch is pushed in. Some gap to the BH opening edge needs to exist up front as the clutch fingers move out to the rear as the disc wears which moves the outer fork position forward, so some room needs to be left for this. If the fork position doesn’t look good, something will need to be changed in the TOB length or shimming the fork pivot.
Then I’ll check that dimension out on the transmission input and see if it looks good for position and room for some free play. My old TO Bearing measured 2.1” long with a Chinese diaphragm clutch. So I’m hoping McLeod has that scienced out with the 2” one they provided. If not I may be back to sourcing another 1.7” TO Bearing. Hopefully it all comes together OK.
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Not sure if it's been mentioned yet. If you get the trans out, clutch assembly off, measure the depth of the space between the flywheel face and the outer face of the bell where the trans meets. If the flywheel is too fat, heavy truck unit, and/or the depth of the bell wrong, thats another possible cause to the bearing problem you're having. Years ago I put an Ansen shield on my Duster. Had issues along the lines of what you're dealing with. Finally measured the depth and it was shorter than my stock bell and a Lakewood unit I had.
TallGuy71
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Well yall. Unfortunately on multiple phone calls today with Brewers the only thing that they saw wrong with my setup was that I still had the over center spring on the clutch pedal. Which would not change anything about me not having any clearance between the TO bearing and the fingers. I took the flywheel off and had it resurfaced today as well. I guess tomorrow I’m going to put it all back together with the new clutch and flex plate we ordered which has a TO bearing that is .05 in shorter and see what happens. I’m pretty discouraged at the moment. Can’t wait to try and get the OC Spring off either. But I did get the proper clutch rod delivered today which should straighten up the Z-Bar linkage once and for all.
TallGuy71
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I will measure this when I get the flywheel back on tomorrow. I meant to do it today before I took it off and forgot.
padam
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What did they say about the fly wheel thickness?
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