[ihc] Joel in the clutch

["Jim Grammer" <jgrammer@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2004 12:25:32 -0700
From: Joel M Brodsky <jmbrodsky@domain.elided>
Subject: [ihc] 12" clutches and I'm sick of it already!

Binders,
      It's been about a year and I've been stumped with this 12" clutch
problem.
Summary:
<schnip>What this means is that I can only push the clutch so far before it
makes a
lot of noise.  If I push the
clutch too far, the actuator fingers actually contact the spinning clutch
dish (spring covers) and sound
terrible.  So, I have only a small region where I push the clutch in and I
can shift, less clutch, no shift,
and more clutch makes noise.

NOW, I looked last night and the fingers are straight, not curved out in
the center like the actuator fingers are on
an 11" clutch assembly.  So, does this mean that the basket is assembled
with the wrong fingers?
or does it mean that the 12" clutch isn't the same as the 11" clutch in its
acutation?

Dunno if you're comparing the same style of clutch between 11" and 12", so
no comment on the finger style comparison. I have been playing with the 12
spring clutches of late, and both 11" and 12" have straight fingers. They
look identical, one's just bigger than the other ;)

I agree with Greg, it sounds like the release levers(fingers) aren't set to
the correct height above the flywheel. Not sure how you get a good
measurement with the unit installed in the truck. TFM says to set by
pressing the unit flat against a steel plate, using precision spacer blocks
to stand off the pressure plate by the nominal thickness of the clutch disk.
I used this method to set up an 11" 12 spring clutch, got them close, and
ended up dialing the finger heights in by mocking up the assembly on a
flywheel.

Without TFM in front of me, I'm pretty sure that the 11" and 12" 12 spring
clutches both use the same release fork height, 2" from flywheel surface to
the top of the adjusting bolt.

It would not surprise me if the rebuilt unit was not adjusted correctly out
of the box. The one I pulled out of my SII clearly was not, and was almost
brand new. Even Allen E's rebuilder of choice screwed up the release fork
height on the first clutch they did for him IIRC. Apparently they just had
the wrong # in their reference.

Jim