Pontiac GTO 2004-2006 - UPDATE: PICS of Chaos!! Clutch blew up last night. Please help out and chime in.

hey guys,

so last night cruising on the highway at 1700rpms in 6th gear.. my spec 3+ clutch sounded like it disntegrated. It has 19k miles on it since it was replaced. Car has a built motor with mild mods and stage iv trans in the 400hp range. Has 245s in the rear so car was more for show then go.

I bought the car with all the mods done to it already. Im concerned with the fact that this happened, >>> is this normal? Freak accident or what? <<<
Gears are all there but car doesnt move had to tow it.

>>> Also with this spec3+ should the clutch pedal be really stiff? <<<
it always was and thought it was cause of the performance clutch. its uncomfortably heavy, 3-4x as heavy as say a stock evo or 3000gt..

Im debating resurfacing flywheel and throwing in a ACT HD street that I found a good deal on or doing a LS7 setup. Will I need a new slave as well? Im a student and will be doing the swap myself with my dad, have done one clutch on a awd 3000gt before. Any pointers are appreciated.

This just absolutely sucks and ruined my week.

Pedal pressure sounds about right, but is check your throw out bearing too before dropping a bunch of money into a new clutch. You could look at Ram clutches also.

It's a pretty strait forward clutch swap, take your starter and driveshaft out first, then your exhaust/ tranny mount, then use a 2 foot extension with (2) 6 inch extensions on the end, then take some masking tape and wrap around a universal (keeps tight and not floppy) and on the end of that use a short 6 point 13mm socket....go in from behind the tail shaft to get the upper bellhousing bolts.


You will find this is easier that the ass clutch you did

sounds great but does this clutch disintegrated out of the blue sound right to you? just cruising at 1700rpms.. could something else be wrong that caused this?

im gonna tear it apart and hope its only the clutch, noise wasnt too loud like a bang, just lost all power, doesnt look like anything shot out the sides either.

and how about bleeding the system? u think i need a new slave although this was just replaced 19k ago?

Slave should be fine, but you will need to tear the clutch out to see what happened

You're going to need to pull the trans to be 100% sure about anything.

Thats all there is to it.


No need to remove the starter to pull the tranny though. Drop the exhaust and DS and thats it.

things happen. it sucks. maybe it wasnt installed properly and just beat on.



at least this way youll know its fixed correctly.

I once had a flywheel bolt fail on an old car years ago when I was a teenager because it wasn't properly torqued by the installer (me). That caused the bolt head to fly all around inside the bellhousing. Scared the crap outta me and sounded like the whole clutch was coming apart. That's when I learned that torque specifications are kinda important. But until you get it apart, you won't know what's really wrong.

finally got the trans out and this is what i found out guys..may not even be a spec product..

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a74/derek321/3566e36a.jpg
http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a74/derek321/07e59689.jpg
http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a74/derek321/e4baf7c3.jpg

is that flywheel garbage now? or replace the pads? and how about the pressure plate?

I'd say its all garbage.

It looks like the clutch disc doesn't have any material left on it and you were using the rivets.
The flywheel looks like you can rebuild it, but why is there 4 separate pieces of material instead of one big mating surface?

I'd say the clutch has been gone for a while now.....not familiar with the flywheel

What is sticking out of the pressure plate in the last picture?

Flywheel appears to be rebuildable. You would need a new matching clutch and pressure plate. The fasteners for the flywheel plates I have replaced were not selected for their ease of replacement.

Gotcha, yea looks to be an rps clutch setup.. what do u guys think of keeping the slave thats in it currently? it has probably less then 15k miles on it and im tight on money..

flywheel pads look replaceable if i can find them that is!

i was thinking about getting an ls7 clutch and flywheel combo and replacing the pilot and putting all back together.. you guys think this may be a good route to go? ill be selling the car pretty soon as well

You should replace the slave while you're in there and add a speed bleeder. You can save some serious coin by buying an Fbody slave and swapping the GTO-specific fitting over from your old slave.

It's a RPS clutch and you can rebuild it, but it's going to cost about $900 plus down-time. If money is tight, get the LS7 clutch (with aluminum flywheel) from sdparts.com. They come with bolts too. You would be foolish not to change the slave and pilot bearing, because they're cheap insurance against problems down the road. Also buy a 48" T56 Release Bearing Bleeder from speedwaymotors.com; it's ~$30 + shipping, bolts right in and is the best deal around.

can someone coin in on the bleeding process with and without a speed bleeder? im a pharmacy student lol so some of this stuff is out of my realm, im just good with some wrenches and reading instructions..

also what is the difference between the ls3 clutch and ls7 clutch? will they hold the same power?

If you don't have a speed bleeder, you'll need a hose to fit over the bleeder nipple and a jar of some kind. Like this: http://www.amazon.com/Genesis-Magnet-Bleeder-Bottle/dp/B000W7K588
Start bleeding and the jar will fill with old fluid and submerge the hose tip. The tip must always be submerged under the fluid so air can not enter. YouTube has brake bleeding videos to walk you through the process.

Get an LS7 clutch assembly. Works great and for about $500 you are up and running again.