Clutch Blown after less than 1000 miles..wtf?
 

Anybody have any ideas as to what might have caused a new clutch to blow after less than 1000 miles. The clucth was broken in properly. I never took the motor over 4000 RPM. The motor was being broken in, too. The hydraulics are fine. The mechanic took the tranny out and said the clutch was done. Why would this happen? Oh, it's an '87 N/A.

You sure you're not being screwed by your mechanic?
Was this a really cheap clutch?

I'm not trying to insult you here.

It is glimpsey possible that whoever drives your car is a really bad driver and like constantly slips the clutch.

Which makes me think. Maybe you should check your clutch hydraulics.

There's several things to do when changing a clutch. Resurface the flywheel to rid of heat spots and warp, make sure no oil is on the clutch disc and flywheel and adjust the clutch so there's some play.
With the motor running see how much play there is. If there is no play, that would be the cause.
There are so many bad mechanics out is the reason why no one touches any of my cars.

who did you take it to? i took my 87 gxl to aamco and they just did a overall shitty job. maybe just get a new mechanic to look at it

yep thats pretty shitty. I never take my car to the mechanic for the same reason. I might have way more headaches this way but at least I know if anything happens to my car it's my doing, not some dumb mechanic. Anyways good luck with it and you should ask him as many questions as possible. what kind of clutch is it? Don't tell me the xtd on ebay :) I'm waiting for this unit to come in the mail and am going to test it out so hopefully the clutch that blew on you was not the xtd for my sake :biggrin: anyways give us some more detail.

ask your mechanic to show you the clutch.

were you experiencing problems with it before the mechanic said that?

what exactly is a blown clutch? what is/was the car doing? and you don't neccesarily have to resurface the flywheel eventhough it is suggested, on my turbo 2 I used this cheap perfection clutch from my work advance auto parts, i didn't resurface the flywheel but then again my clutch disc, pressure plate, and flywheel were still all good just my throw-out bearing was smashed. it could be oil, whether it be gear oil or engine oil leaked on to the clutch disc surface causing slippage even with a brandnew clutch. we need some details here.

mayb it was one of those fake clutches off of ebay

As I said in my original post, the hydraoulics are all fine. I don't slip the clutch at all. Dunno what brand the clutch was. It didn't ring a bell, so I didn't remember it. But, either way, a Racing Beat disc and pressure plate are being put in in its place. I just wanted to see what everyone else thought so this same thing wouldn't happen again to this clutch.

Hondahater: I've used the XTD clutches before, they're OK and hold up pretty good.

It could have been just a shitty reman job on the disk you bought (if it was a reman)...

It would help if you could tell us EXACTLY what was wrong with the clutch (rivets popped, glazed over, throwout failed, etc...)

ahhh thanks sonic, I've been looking for good feedback on these clutches. How long did you have it? Anyways sorry to get off topic. I don't know I just wouldn't trust the mechanic until I saw the clutch in person and got a few oppinions from people on this site. Good luck with the racing beat setup I've heard nothing but good stuff about it.

Well, it wasn't some clutch off eBay. I know that much. It was remanufactured. I was driving last Monday, it started feeling more and more difficult to get the car into gear. Then, it just stopped going into gear altogether. It went into gear fine with the motor off, but wouldn't go in at all with the motor running. It acted like I wasn't stepping on the clutch pedal at all. The shop I took it to is a rotary-only shop called Rotary RX. Everyone out here says nothing but good things about the shop. And just to be absolutely safe, the throwout bearing is being replaced, too. The last thing I want is to get a new clutch, then a few days later, the throwout bearing fail.

At last - symptoms.

Ruling out what you’ve checked, that leaves the pilot bearing or a clearance problem at the clutch disc.

A clearance problem might be a bond or rivet failure in the disc face material which would be a defect in materials/workmanship.
If there is any foreign debris stuck between the disc & the pressure plate, that would be an installer problem.
Either of those problems are reasons for a serious warranty discussion.

Whenyou changed it last time, did you change only the disk?

What about the pressure plate?
Throwout Bearing?
Needle Bearing?

If the PP was weak, it could have been responsable for the previous disk to burn out. By replacing only the disk and leaving the faulty PP, it was bound to wear out the new disk quickly - but 1000 miles is suspect in my mind. I'd see if that disk has some sort of warantee with it.

As a general rule, whenever the trani is off the car, replace the TO and needle bearings. They are cheap and easy to replace while the trani is off.

whats a needle bearing? is it the same with the TO and pilot bearing provided if you were to buy a new clutch kit?

Sorry, the needle bearing is the pilot bearing.

Just the clutch disc and the pressure plate were replaced. This time around, everything's getting replaced, however.

On the subject of ebay clutchs lol why not just get an OEM. They work but make sure you get it for what car you have S4 and S5 are not the same shit but the clutch disc. Everything Pressure plate, throwout bearing and i'm not sure about pilot bearing are different.

what did you just say? the reason why people (me included) get ebay clutches are because they handle more hp then the oem clutches and from the reputation of the xtd clutches I've heard they are not that bad for the money.