Clutch trouble

[Jimm218]

Well a bad situation just got worse. The clutch went a few weeks ago and had to have the car brought back home on a flatbed.

So I duely ordered a new clutch from one of the expected suppliers. Quick delivery and a competitive price so I was as happy as you can be when having to shell out.

Well the car is now in bits and the new clutch does not fit. The splines on the friction material are not correct and if you try to bolt it up then the springs in the friction plate (coded 2560-205) make contact with the flywheel bolts. The kit I have been sent is a CP5282-34gry.

Having discovered that it doesn't fit I have looked more closely at the two clutches. They are different in most dimensions. The one I took off is a CP5282-2CRV. The friction plates don't have springs and are coded 2560-540. So clearly they are different parts.

What is going on? Have I just been sent the wrong clutch or is there something I am missing?

Any information would help.

Thanks

[sonnylad]

Looking at the top of the clutch does yours have the step down or is it a big bevelled edge.


If so you still have the old style clutch fitted and may require a new bell housing.

Edited by sonnylad on Saturday 1st June 20:21

[Jimm218]

My old clutch has the bevelled edge and the new one has the step down. I guess this could cause issues with interference.

However, that doesn't explain why the springs in the plate catch on the flywheel bolts and the splines are different. Does any one know the part code for the friction plates is? Also the old pressure plate has bolt on spring fingers is there a source for these as everything else could be reused.

As far as I am aware the gearbox was changed in 2001 by Brundel TVR and the car hasn't had a clutch since.

Thanks.

[sonnylad]

Old bevelled edge clutches have not been available for many many years, plus when the clutches changed the bell housing was also altered i know as had to go to all that expense myself.

Im sure someone posted on here a few years back had managed to get the new unit working on old bell housing after some angle grinding,,, but for an item that is so prone to failure on the Cerbera i would fit a new housing.

[sonnylad]

The new style bell housing looks like this:

[ridds]

Count your gearbox input shaft splines. You should have 23.

Also, are you using a clutch alignment tool to check that the splines are aligned as this may stop you inserting the shaft.

Apart from that it does sound like you have a early set-up which I though require the complete set of parts, flywheel, bell housing and slave cylinder.

See RG's website here

This conversion requires the later 4.5 ltr V8 Flywheel (TVR E3569) and fitting kit (TVR Q KITAJPFIT), the Twin Plate Clutch Assembly (TVR Q0365), Slave Cylinder Kit (TVR Q KITAJPSCYL) and Clutch Release Bearing (TVR Q0107). Requires fitting, please enquire by calling us @ Racing Green TVR. All parts listed are available separately, please contact Racing Green TVR for more details.

[Jimm218]

Thanks for the replies.

Well I have it back together. I still have no drive

So the new friction plates do fit on the splines. There was some crap on them stopping them slide. However, the springs catch on the flywheel bolts. I spoke to TVR Power and they said they just grind the bolts down to clear the new friction plates. Looking at my car that would take most of the meat off the heads and I wouldn't be happy with that. So as I am supposed to be taking the car to Belgium in a couple of weeks I reused the old friction plates (not I ideal but they had plenty of meat left on them and don't have the springs). I used the new spring plate and everything bolted up fine. Now when I try to get gears the clutch just slips. I can get it to roll about 1mph but no more than that. I have tried bleeding the clutch again and adjusting the master cylinder to both extremes with no joy.

I don't understand why this won't work. I compared the two spring plates and can see no major difference in their dimensions. Particularly not the height to the spring tips.

Can someone explain to me where the difference in the old and new clutch is? And subsequently where the difference in the new flywheels, bell housings and slave cylinders are?

If anyone has an old style spring plate or can get just the springs (I've see them on RG but that seems a tad OTT) I would be interested.

Thanks

Jimm

[Tanguero]

Did you change the slave?

[Jimm218]

It is the same slave but I did the seals while it was apart. No pitting or scoring.

[Tanguero]

The seals shouldn't make any difference. There are at least a couple of versions of the slave, using one which is too tall can permanently disengage the clutch, but if you didn't change the slave it won't be that.

[esso]

Mixing and matching the component parts is a reciepe for disaster i`m afraid,i found this out when i was supplied with and fitted the wrong slave-cylinder.You must ensure all the parts fitted to the car exactly match the ones that came off the car.Have you checked the master-cylinder by the way...the seals on these fail on a regular basis and will not allow you to bleed the clutch.Sorry to give you the bad news but Cerbs are bhes at times............
Also when you fitted the seals to the slave did you make sure that you didn`t pinch them....are you losing any fluid anywhere you shouldn`t,i.e. in the drivers footwell or under the car when you bleed the clutch?

Edited by esso on Sunday 9th June 10:37

Edited by esso on Sunday 9th June 10:38

[sonnylad]

I have an old secondhand but new style flywheel your welcome to have if you want to pay for me to send it out to you.

Condition looks poor but always worked fine in mine, only got removed as now have an LS fitted so was no longer needed.

[Jimm218]

Thanks for the replies. I didn't want to mix and match parts but had little choice as the old style spring plates aren't available. That is all that I've changed and I can't work out where the difference is.

I have no leaks and used red rubber grease on the seals when putting them back in and they went together smoothly. If the clutch hadn't bleed properly would I see these symptoms?

Sonny you have PM. Thanks

[esso]

If the clutch had not bled properly you would have difficulty in getting the car into gear.It sounds like something is pressuring the clutch.When i fitted my new slave cylinder the piston was 5m/m too long and i had the same symptoms as you,no drive as the clutch was slipping,i didn`t have this before i changed the slave cylinder.Something is obviously causing the clutch to slip.

[Griffithy]

Hi Jimm,

any news,
could you solve it?

[alinton]

Same thing happened to me when replacing the clutch on my old 4.2.

Found that grinding the allen-head bolt heads to a slightly conical shape allowed enough clearance.

I also recall problems fitting old slave to new clutch - as someone has said, it put the clutch under pressure and it slipped all the time.

A.

[Jimm218]

Sorry for the delay in updating this. It has taken me a while to get back to trying to fix it. I've moved house since the first time I put it back together.

So the important bit is, it works! All fixed and running again.

I have some pictures to post of the differences when I get around to it. But in the end I replaced the flywheel with a latter one so that the new clutch plates with the springs would fit. Thanks to Sonnylad! Then I managed to find out the difference in the clutch setups. Basically the new design is 5mm thicker than the only one, which is why the clutch would slip permanently. To solve this I have had the slave cylinder machined so that it is shorter and therefore the clutch does not slip all the time. I guess I could have just brought a new slave which are shorter. I have not had to modify the bell housing in any way.

Pictures to come. Thanks to all those who offered advice.

[sonnylad]

Excellent news and good to see it worked out ok