Nope never forgotten how old my 18yr car is, or the 22yr old i drive fairly often or the 47yr old sat in the driveway. All of them get the necessary tweeks to keep them to there optimum, some just basic maintenance others modded to the extreme - either way its relative to the use they are put through. the 18yr mk2 is now batterd and beaten, but still puts a smile on my face and can show a few supercars where to go on track, this one gets the most of the money pot as its the one that gets the most punishment. The 22yr old mk1 is a daily run around, nothing to pretty but reliable and pokey, whereas the 47yr old gets fiddled with every now and again, but boasts having the second most expensive kit i've ever bought at over 500 !! I started tracking the mk2 some 8+ years ago and all that the previous owner had done was fit 15" wheels, since then its been evo'd over a long time to the "state" its in now, technically it needs a new shell due to rot but that will happen later in the year! Its all relative really i guess, i could be sitting in 25k+ caterham or other but you use whats available to you at the time! So interesting ideas/thought and yes i have tried them !
Is anyone listening to Golden??? When i had my Helix clutch fitted to my old engine the mechanic showed me the plate that the gearbox push rod presses against (sorry i'm not very good with component names ). The push rod was wearing the plate out as it was not pushing on the centre of it. I asked the mechanic why this was happening and he just shrugged his shoulders and i never thought any more of it................Until a couple of months later while doing a throttle body conversion i noticed there was about 2mm endfloat on the crank. That led to a new engine.......... [:^(]
Box is coming of soon... (maybe today or tomorrow and i'll take it from there. Celica-Fan (old man - dad) is talking complete crap again The 15 year old chasis is giving me NO problem - the brand new LUK and Helix clutch are giving me problem. Good point well made..... errm... NOT
Picture update - sorry about the size, but i waned to get quite a large pic on to show the detail. This is the centre plate that was taken off when the Helix unit was removed. As you can see the push-rod appears to have worn a massive hole off-centre. It seems to be have been consistantly wearing the same part, rather than moving all over the place. On the rear of the plate the dimple has cracked through. But i appreciate you opinions on this. Front: Back Edited by: Tubthumped
The normal cause of this is excessive wear in the clutch pushrod bush. It's also possible that the disc can jam off-centre but less likely
I suppose it could also be excessive wear in the gearbox input shaft but that would be some wear. Did you:- Put grease on the back of the plate? Put grease on the large circlip where it goes under the 3 tangs on the pressure plate? Put a new circlip on? Most importantly, make sure the disc was centred in the middle of the pressure plate?
I know the push rod bush was new, as I fitted it. I'm thinking that maybe the pushrod plate was offset in the pressure plate as it's worn it in only in one place which indicates that the plate was throwing. If the input shaft was out, the push rod would have worn a groove around the centre rivet of that plate, rather than wear a single hole as the rod would then be offset to the plate. Drop the box off anyway, I'll change the inputshaft bearing, pushrod, pushrod bush and the seal as a matter of course.
I personally, would agree with Hotgolf, it looks like the plate has been jammed off-centre. That's why I asked if it was all greased properly and moved freely so it it could self centre as it's supposed to. Tubs, what was wrong with the standard temp clutch when you took it out?
Don't wrry Matt - everything that has been mentioned will be checked, i hope my engine hasn't suffered the same fate as yours though. I am quietly confident it hasn't though... see below. UPDATE on the LUK clutch: Gearbox is now in the back of the Astra TURBO (van) and i have found my LUK clutches problem - it's in 2 pieces! I've looked at the new centre plate fitted with this LUK clutch and the marking on it suggests everything is running central - but again, opinions really are appreciated.
I believe that's what the aircraft industry calls a catastrophic faliure. I think I might be inclined to just put that down to a crap clutch (next time buy a Sachs ).
No chance - Helix will be going back in I'm still gonna be checking everything, but i'm a lot more confident that the Helix was caused by human error (my fitting) and the LUK just bad luck.
We are sorted Martin has had the box off me today and noticed a bearing had collapsed. All is being sorted and i should be up and running in a fortnights time
