Drivetrain Setting Up A New Clutch--Tips Please

Have you watched the Paul Cangialosi videos for how to shim the bearing retainer and set preload? His T5 rebuild videos are very informative.
 
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Argh, I just watched another video about it, and all it really said is your pivot ball stud could be at the wrong height, and you might need to shim it, but it gave absolutely no information about how you KNOW it's at the wrong height or how you'd know it's at the right height! All we know is having it at the wrong height is bad. Thanks guy. Very informative. Ugh.

Hell, at this point I don't even know if that's my issue and if changing the pivot ball height will do anything for me! It's just the only thing I know of that I could change! Everything else is where it's going to be, except maybe the flywheel could be shimmed, but again, it's brand new! And I've heard it's pretty hard for the flywheel manufacturers to screw up where the rear surface of that flywheel is supposed to be.
Read down this thread for the easiest advice on pivot ball height if the plane of the fork on the cable end is ahead of the pivot ball head=bad. If the plane of the fork is aft of the pivot ball head=good. Mine is AFU because I left out the lockwasher now after cable changes quadrant changes adjustments and readjustments it's back off with the trans to put the dang blamit lockwasher back under the pivot and try again. Hope you have better luck.
 
Read down this thread for the easiest advice on pivot ball height if the plane of the fork on the cable end is ahead of the pivot ball head=bad. If the plane of the fork is aft of the pivot ball head=good. Mine is AFU because I left out the lockwasher now after cable changes quadrant changes adjustments and readjustments it's back off with the trans to put the dang blamit lockwasher back under the pivot and try again. Hope you have better luck.

Thanks, sounds like something I would do.

I did get the trans apart, and found out how exactly to measure whether the cable end is more forward than the pivot ball. So, we're getting somewhere. slowly but surely.

You need to install the clutch, bell housing, clutch fork, ball stud and throwout bearing. Before doing this, measure the distance from the trans/bell housing interface plane to the geometric center of the ball stud. This will be the center of its spherical head. Once these parts are assembled, push the cable end of the clutch fork forward, until the throwout bearing just touches the clutch PP fingers. Now measure the distance from the trans/bell housing plane to the geometric center of the concave surface in the end of the clutch fork for the cable ferrule. Now draw a line between these two pivot points in the clutch fork.

When viewed from the top of the car or the bottom of the car, the pivot point at the cable end of the clutch fork should be about 0.5" - 0.75" closer to the trans/bell housing plane than the ball stud pivot point is to the same plane. This is to ensure that the clutch fork has the longest average length. When the clutch is pushed down far enough to shift the car, the outer pivot point will then be 0.75" further from the plane, than the inner pivot point is.
 
You should not have to adjust the pivot ball, look at what you changed and compare the two pieces, did you change the clutch quadrant or are you still using the stock adjustable one, are you sure the clutch fork is on the pivot ball, is your throw out bearing the correct one and mounted right?
 
You can remove the pivot without pulling the trans.

How?

Iv been fighting my clutch engagement forever and iv tried just about everything sept messing with the pivot ball.

my setup is a Spec stage 3, Mcleod bellhousing, TKO using a extended arm.

My clutch engages super high, seems like if i adjust it to lower it then it will not disengage.
 
Hey all.
So my old clutch was pretty heavy, so i thought i would try some nice new parts. Here's what I bought: Maximum Motorsports cable, quadrant, firewall adjuster, and pedal height adjuster, Summit (USA made) clutch fork, National throwout bearing, Valeo clutch kit, Astro bearing retainer, new pivot ball stud (can't recall brand), and SVE (McLeod) billet steel flywheel.

This is a 5.0L and T-5 for the record. I got everything put back together, and it isn't functioning right. For starters, the clutch fork doesn't sit at the rear of its opening in the bellhousing. It's like 1/3 to 1/2 way forward before it touches the pressure plate fingers. What could cause that? If I shim the pivot ball stud, will that help? How do I know how much to shim it?

Next, it's hard to put in gear unless it's rolling. Sounds like it's not disengaging all the way, right? But also, it slips out of 5th when cruising at speed. WTF?! It's not engaging all the way either?!

I'm planning on pulling the trans back out to try and remedy all this. What do you recommend I do?

On a side note, I've heard you don't want to change the bearing retainer without checking the internal thrust of the transmission. I did not. Could this be related to my problems putting it in gear?

Any advice would be much appreciai would


i would bet a lot has to do with you slapping that bearing retainer on without doing any measurments!