Read if you have a clutch squeal problem!
05-26-2007, 11:42 AM
#1
Read if you have a clutch squeal problem! When I first swapped my SPEC 3 into my car, it squealed very loudly when pulling off the line, or anytime the RPM wasn't matched to the tranny speed, but ALWAYS in first gear. The chatter I had eventually died down after the proper break-in period (about 500-800 miles I noticed it going away), but the squeal was obnoxiously loud and remained an ever present embarrassing feature of the car even though the clutch has now been in for about 5,000 miles.
I called SPEC when I first noticed it wasn't going away, after about 1,000 miles, and they told me that clutch should never be making that noise, especially with that clutch disk, so it must be the pilot bearing or some other part rubbing on something and I would have to take it apart and replace whatever it was that was rubbing. Not having the technical facility to do a clutch swap or anything close to it on my own, especially on the floor of my garage, I just dealt with the noise as it didn't seem to affect performance that I could tell (although, it was quite embarrassing pulling away from red lights and got me a lot of bizarre looks).
I had read that for some clutches having this problem, I believe the Textralia and maybe a few others, if you did some hard launches, slipping the clutch quite a bit, or something similar, the sound would go away as it would rid the disk of any oils and grease and anything else that may be causing the sound. I attempted this a few times on the street, but the sound remained. I figured the guy at SPEC was correct.
YESTERDAY, I went to a track rental day and beat the hell out of my car with brand new Nittos and a 12-bolt on it. I made 15 passes and for the last six or so, I was launching the car pretty hard from about 4000-4500, letting the clutch out very quickly. The track was two hours away, and about halfway home, I realized that the squealing sound was COMPLETELY GONE. I took it out this morning, and still no squealing.
Obviously the SPEC tech was totally wrong, because the only thing I can imagine this could mean is that something wasn't worn in correctly, probably the disk, and by making all of those hard launches consecutively, it cleared it and broke it in like it was supposed to. The clutch also feels a bit different. I have to let it out a bit farther before it catches, but it feels stiffer. It never got soft or anything at the track.
Anyways, I am obviously not happy with SPEC as they could have saved me a lot of embarrassment and time worrying about broken stuff in my car. I am thinking that the launches I attempted on the street probably just weren't good enough or hard enough since I had street tires and immediately started spinning. I just thought this post might help a lot of people who I have read about that have this problem.
I called SPEC when I first noticed it wasn't going away, after about 1,000 miles, and they told me that clutch should never be making that noise, especially with that clutch disk, so it must be the pilot bearing or some other part rubbing on something and I would have to take it apart and replace whatever it was that was rubbing. Not having the technical facility to do a clutch swap or anything close to it on my own, especially on the floor of my garage, I just dealt with the noise as it didn't seem to affect performance that I could tell (although, it was quite embarrassing pulling away from red lights and got me a lot of bizarre looks).
I had read that for some clutches having this problem, I believe the Textralia and maybe a few others, if you did some hard launches, slipping the clutch quite a bit, or something similar, the sound would go away as it would rid the disk of any oils and grease and anything else that may be causing the sound. I attempted this a few times on the street, but the sound remained. I figured the guy at SPEC was correct.
YESTERDAY, I went to a track rental day and beat the hell out of my car with brand new Nittos and a 12-bolt on it. I made 15 passes and for the last six or so, I was launching the car pretty hard from about 4000-4500, letting the clutch out very quickly. The track was two hours away, and about halfway home, I realized that the squealing sound was COMPLETELY GONE. I took it out this morning, and still no squealing.
Obviously the SPEC tech was totally wrong, because the only thing I can imagine this could mean is that something wasn't worn in correctly, probably the disk, and by making all of those hard launches consecutively, it cleared it and broke it in like it was supposed to. The clutch also feels a bit different. I have to let it out a bit farther before it catches, but it feels stiffer. It never got soft or anything at the track.
Anyways, I am obviously not happy with SPEC as they could have saved me a lot of embarrassment and time worrying about broken stuff in my car. I am thinking that the launches I attempted on the street probably just weren't good enough or hard enough since I had street tires and immediately started spinning. I just thought this post might help a lot of people who I have read about that have this problem.
