{"id":5537,"date":"2014-05-08T13:37:33","date_gmt":"2014-05-08T20:37:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=5537"},"modified":"2016-11-30T12:03:38","modified_gmt":"2016-11-30T20:03:38","slug":"three-pedals-on-the-floor-different-strokes-for-different-folks-part-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/three-pedals-on-the-floor-different-strokes-for-different-folks-part-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Pedals on the Floor: Different Strokes for Different Folks, Part I"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Clutch<\/a><\/p>\n

Today, there\u2019s a wide array of clutches available on the high performance market, from complex race-only equipment to street only pieces.\u00a0 In between are some pretty neat combinations \u2013 hardware that is perfectly suited for both the street and the strip.\u00a0 And like the race-only gear, it ranges from basic to sophisticated.\u00a0 What follows is a look at two very different clutch \u201csystems\u201d.\u00a0 Check it out.\u00a0 The range of possibilities is endless.<\/p>\n

Back-to-Basics<\/b><\/p>\n

Yesteryear has a melancholy pang to it.\u00a0 Plenty of folks pine for it. Some cling to it. Certainly, as writers, we dig the \u201cmodern\u201d computers we use for writing these pieces along with all of the other \u201cmodern\u201d things they can do for us, but when it comes to cars (all sorts of cars), yours truly just happens to like stuff that can be fixed.\u00a0 And fixed easily (OK\u2026.we suspect it has something to do with old age and familiarity, but lets not go there!).\u00a0 Now, as it turns out, we also happen to dig stick shift cars.\u00a0 And for us at least, clutch assemblies fall into that simple (and familiar) category.<\/p>\n

Way back when (or at least in the 1970s), the clutch package to have was a Borg & Beck\/Long combination pressure plate, a sprung hub disc (with a Marcel) and some sort of steel flywheel.\u00a0 There was a very good reason for this combination. \u00a0Most will recall that the old diaphragm pressure plates found behind most Chevy\u2019s (and other GM products) offered pretty good pedal feel, but they often had one ugly tendency:\u00a0 They could stick to the floor at wide open throttle.\u00a0 Not exactly good.\u00a0 And cast iron flywheels (of any sort) weren\u2019t exactly good news either. When (not \u201cif\u201d) they decided to depart, they had a tendency to take big chunk of the car with them.\u00a0 If you didn\u2019t have a scattershield, then your personal body parts were at the mercy of the departing hardware too.\u00a0 As far as the discs were concerned, some of the really good ones happened to be copies of Chevy\u2019s L88 Corvette disc.\u00a0 They worked and the springs never rattled out.\u00a0 Overall, it was a dirt simple arrangement. It got the job done and unless the clutch was incredibly abused, it seldom failed.\u00a0 And if and when the clutch package needed service, the steps required for maintenance were equally dirt simple.\u00a0 Life was good.<\/p>\n

That was then. Time and technology marched forward.\u00a0 Sophisticated multiple discs became the norm. Disc diameters shrunk (some by dramatic margins).\u00a0 Some setups seen in racing circles went from two to three or more discs.\u00a0 Soon there were a lot of different pieces contained within the bellhousing.\u00a0 These new clutch packages are obviously fabulous with light pedal pressures, great clamping power and so on, but to me at least, they lack one basic ingredient:\u00a0 They\u2019re not exactly simple.<\/p>\n

So what\u2019s a guy to do \u2013 especially if you\u2019re like us and stuck in what some might consider a forty-or-so year old simplicity time warp?\u00a0 That\u2019s easy. Just check out the following.\u00a0 You\u2019ll still find hardware of choice from the Seventies (and in future issues, we\u2019ll look at some much more modern technology). But even with the advances, the basic premise for a back-to-basics clutch package is the same:\u00a0 A Borg & Beck\/Long combination pressure plate, steel flywheel coupled with a sprung hub disc.<\/p>\n

In the photos and captions that follow, we\u2019ll take a close look at today\u2019s old (new) single disc clutch setups from the folks at McLeod.\u00a0 Check it out. If you yearn for the simplicity of yesteryear, this clutch setup is for you.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"This<\/a>
This is the 25-pound steel, 168-tooth ring gear flywheel we used behind a 427-inch big block Chevy. When considering flywheels, you\u2019ll find there are plenty of different weights. Typically, they range from 25 pounds to 30 to 40-pounds for most Chevy\u2019s.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Why<\/a>
Why the need for different flywheel weights? Simple. A 283-powered \u201962 Impala is going to need a whole bunch more flywheel weight to get the mass moving than an L88 in a 1969 \u2018Vette. You\u2019ll need to specify the engine balance (internal or external) for your specific combination when ordering a flywheel. You\u2019ll have to consider diameter, and obviously ring gear configuration too.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"It\u2019s<\/a>
It\u2019s not a big piece, but it\u2019s extremely important. This flywheel carries an SFI sticker. That means it\u2019s technically legal for sanctioned drag strip use. Even if your car never rails down the 1320, the SFI sticker should bring peace of mind, because an identical flywheel passed a stringent independent SFI test. In that procedure, the flywheel did not fail during a rotational test and post inspection didn\u2019t reveal signs of failure such as cracks, discontinuities or elongation. As a manufacturer, you only get the sticker when the product passes the test.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"What<\/a>
What you\u2019re looking at is something that McLeod pioneered \u2013 and it\u2019s something that goes a way back in time. What McLeod did was to craft a special pressure plate that uses the heavy-duty hat of a Borg & Beck clutch, but with Ford Long style levers. The Borg & Beck configuration allows the pieces to fit in Chevy applications. Remember back in the good old days we used clamping loads that were massive? That added up to stiff (some super stiff) pedal pressures. That\u2019s not entirely necessary today, given modern disc materials.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"As<\/a>
As a result, you can get away with a 2200-pound clamp load clutch \u2013 and that\u2019s what this one is. McLeod offers similar pressure plates with clamp loads ranging from 2200 to 2400 to 2700 pounds, if you\u2019re so inclined. Additionally, they\u2019re available in varied bolt circles, and with or without counterweights. Watch for more info on this setup in the next issue.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Source
\n<\/span><\/b>McLEOD RACING
\n<\/b>1600 Sierra Madre Circle
\nPlacentia, California 92870
\nPh: 714-630-2764<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, there\u2019s a wide array of clutches available on the high performance market, from complex race-only equipment to street only pieces. In between are some pretty neat combinations \u2013 hardware that is perfectly suited for both the street and the strip. <\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":5539,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11,9,5012],"tags":[825,827,669,826,828,321],"class_list":["post-5537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-how-tos","category-tech-tips","category-transmission-clutch","tag-clutch-package","tag-flywheel","tag-mcleod-racing","tag-pressure-plate","tag-single-disc-clutch","tag-wayne-scraba"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Clutch-1Feature.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-1rj","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5537"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5537\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33232,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5537\/revisions\/33232"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}