Loose P. plate bolts - Help!

MartianBob

Registered User
I called in sick to pull my tranny today, in the rain, in my driveway; big fun!

Long story short (sort of). The cluth would not DisEngage when fully depressedf (even if I pumped the hell out of it). If I'm driving down the road and press the clutch in, it does not release; If I then give it some gas, the motor will eventually overpower it and spin it (again, the clutch is pressed in completely). The car has to be off, and stopped in order to shift gears, but then it is smooth as silk.

So I yanked it apart today and discovered my Presure plate to flywheel bolts had loosened a bit. About 3/32 gap between the presure plate and the flywheel.

Facts:

Two months ago I replaced my clutch disc, presure plate, flywheel with Spec Aluminum flywheel and Stage II clutch. The flywheel, disc, and presure plate were bolted together when I recieved them from Spec. I match marked them just to be safe and took them apart to install. I was glad Spec had supplied some new presure plate bolts because Ford has discontinued them.

Trust me, I systematically torqued them down a little bit at time in a star pattern (to 25 ft lb's) when I installed them. There was no gap between Pressure plate lip and flywheel when I installed it.

The presure plate bolts from Spec (grade 12.9 allen head) did not come with lock washers. I bought some stainless lock washers that fit perfect . The spec bolts had no shoulder, although the stock bolts had a shoulder with a slightly Smaller diameter than the threads (I could not get the washers off to re-use them). I put new flywheel bolts from Ford on too.

Now I'm wondering:

1. What do I do now? Put the original stock bolts back on with some LokTite and hope for the best? Pulling the tranny out is a pain and I don't want to do it again. This car is my daily driver, and my only car!

2. Also, even when it was working, it only dissengaged at the very bottom when the clutch was fully deperessed. I'd like to shim out the slave about 1/8 inch, it felt like it needed this when it was new. Any suggestions in this department? Cut up a piece of sheet metal or aluminum?

3. Can someone please make a logical guess as to what happend and why it won't happen again so I can sleep when I bolt this stuff back on?

Any ideas / advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks
Bob
 
I had a similar problem with the low clutch pedal after installing the aluminum Mcleod flywheel. I burned up syncros pretty quick like that.

So when I took it apart I measured the distance from the block face to the friction surface on the flywheel and compared it to a stock one. I found I was about .100" low with the aluminum flywheel.

So I made shims out of sheet metal for the slave cylinder and it has been fine ever since. I say clean the threads real well and lock tite them. They won't come out again. Perhaps you didn't get them as tight as you thought you did.

Anyway, that is what I would do.
 
Makes Sense.

Thanks for the response Dave,

I'll definitely find a way to shim the slave a bit. It sure felt like it needed it.

As for the bolts, I think I'll clean up the stock bolts, LockTite them and torque them back in.

By the way, this last week was hard on my synchros. Any specific tips on replacing M5R2 synchros would go a long way.

Cheers
Bob
 
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