In my Estate running a 2.0 Zetec on throttle bodies and a S2 box, must be 180BHP tops.
Quite often running fully laden with tons of photo gear crammed in the boot/back seats...... and driven hard.

First clutch was a regular 220mm part, lasted a few months, never had a great bite. Eventually slipped really badly when power was applied, drove it for a few weeks like that before changing.

Second clutch was an AP Racing non-paddle unit. Took a few hundred miles to bed in then it was fine. Not an amazing bite, but never slipped. Lasted a coupe of weeks then shatterd into thousands of pieces!

Third clutch was fitted last week, another regular unit. Seemed good for the first few days, no bedding in process. Then it started slipping badly on anything more than half power all of a sudden



Any ideas about the problems? Hardly a huge power car, and clutches lasting a week is not really good enough!

 

no sign of oil contamination on the ones that come out?

 

Thats real bad luck.

Looks like its going to have to be a re-surfaced flywheel and a Helix paddle.

 

yeah skimmed fly wheel!i got thru a box and clutch every 3 months when mine was just a tweeked 2 litre,had changing it all to a T now

 

skimmed flywheel and an luk frst clutch should be fine.
without skimming the flywheel, it'll still keep chewing clutches.

 

i'd do what simon sais, surface the flywheel and helix padle! helix padle's dont feel heavy...

 

Are Helix padles 4 or 6 and are they juddery on pull away like the AP ones?

 

skim the fly wheel and put in a std pressure plate with a 4 paddle ap

 

dont know about juddery, they are 4 padle, havent tried mine yet can only tell you its not heavy with a standard pedal!

 

Karlos I had a Helix 4 paddle clutch rated for about 260ft plus fitted about a week ago at Jam-Sport and it’s a bitch to drive the clutch is too viscous and aggressive to drive the pedal is a bit hard on biting point and to move off in 1st gear I have to rev it at almost 2000rpm for it to move off smoothly other wise it will judder badly feels like my gearbox is gonna break (I hope not) and the clutch pedal sits too high than the two other pedals but im taking the car back for them to have a look at it. Do you know what it could be or is that normal?

 

Now that sounds like fun in my daily driver

 

im going for the 4 paddle and std pressure plate to try to make it more normal

 

you dont want a 4 paddle !!!! on or off !!!!
Are you launching hard from standstill?

 

No, the clutch just has a very strong bite I can even sometimes feel it bite a bit when I go up the gears at normal speeds.

 

Now and again, but that's not really the issue.

It starts off slipping when changing up on full throttle, and evenually progresses to just slipping whenever more than half power is applied....

 

Could a worn cable and/or ratchet be causing problems?

 

All of what you describe is normal.I have the same on my AP clutch.Only I adjusted the height of my clutch pedal so that its only a bit higher than the brake pedal.But my car is only used on track,and in that situation its perfect.I doubt Jam-Sport will be able to help you out,its the nature of the beast.Think about it,a good strong clutch will never be light and gentle to engage!!!!I'm just happy my clutch does'nt slip,you should thinking along my lines. Best regards,Micky

 

when i put an ap 4 padle in mine i found my clutch pedal was very high, i put a mk 5 escort pedal and quadrant on mine. you have to cut ten teeth from the quadrant and it works a treat. obviously then it can be adjusted to wherever you want it.

 

ade a helix paddle clutch isnt as bad as what people are making out.

 

heres a good idea


how about drive like miss daisy

that way the clutch will last forever

 

Cheers for that advice mate I will tell Jam-Sport about that and see what they think about it but will that also help to stop my car from juddering when I move off in 1st gear at low revs?

 

Why not an AP Racing one, are they more brutal?

 

Nope,it will still judder,did you not read my post????Regards,Micky

 

As Micky said a 4 paddle clutch will judder like mad, and you cant have a pansy clutch that holds big torque, if you want one that doesnt slip then it will be heavy!

 

I had a helix pedal clutch for about 4years, my fiesta was driven daily in the maltese traffic and it's an 1.8diesel with 2.7bar boost was like hell. but the clutch was the great. juddered a bit on take off on low revs but the hell with that, changed the front mounting now and then especially when driving back at 4 in the morning with some heavy alcohol powered driving. I would slip the clutch on 4th gear and it would burstn into tyre smoke. It used to run 13.7s. never slipped the clutch . when i took the engine aprat I changed the pads on the clutch diy job with something like 60gbp and faced the flywheel with a little offset to get some of what was worn on the p/plate side. hell another new clutch ready for another 3 year of tashing around.

The trick with any clutch is always check the p/plate to flywheel distance before tightening, should always be from 3 to 5mm .... more or less and you loose the bite...

Warren
Mk1 Cortina

 

Sounds good to me!