I am driving my first manual transmission car....and I was wondering if you more experienced MT drivers know how long does a typical clutch last under normal driving conditions?

How long before I need to look into another set of clutch? Thanks your advice is appreciated.

 

This is my 3rd MT Max SE now and I have yet to replace a clutch. I usually put right about 50K miles on each car and then turn them in (lease). I was told by my service manager at Nissan that the clutches are pretty durable and he almost never replaces one on a 3 year/45K lease.

Being a new MT driver, you might not be as lucky. I have been driving MT cars every since I turned 16 y/o...17 years ago.

 

Depends how you treat it. Kinda like brakes.

If you are hard on it, 60K miles, easy on it 160K miles.

Depends on where you drive to. Long highway (not much clutching going on) or San-Fransico Pizza delivery?

Be nice to it, but not too nice, 100K miles should be easy to hit.

I had a friend do 140K miles in a Civic, and he beat that thing to hell.

 

My experience with Maxima clutches have been in the 60-70k miles range. Of course, your mileage may vary.

 

thanks for all your input~ My next question may be kind of hard to answer,

To what extent is "Clutch wear" consider normal to a experienced Manual driver?

In my case is, I know I have to keep "Clutch wear" to minimal, so there for I need to engage clutch pretty fast when i am upshifting. But by doing that, I am not driving SMOOTHLY according to my passengers. Because they feel the clutch engaging.

So, my ultimate question is, is it possible to be a smooth manual driver, without causing (too much) clutch wear to occure?

 

You should try pulling off the clutch at a moderately smooth disengage. If you see your passeners being jerked you are coming off too fast, this should be done when racing, but try to make smooth changes, I have also had clutches since I was 17 only 5 years ago, so some may think that I am an ameture, but my cars lasted me past 100K before changing clutches.

 

My 89SE clutch lasted me till 140k miles and probably would have gone longer if it weren't for a synchro failing problem prompting me to do everything.

And as for clutch longevity, you don't necessarily increase a clutch's lifespan by fast shifting. What you want to avoid is lugging the engine (where the drive shaft speed doesn't match the transmission). This is bad for the engine, transmission and the clutch.

 

system which makes the revs slow down very gradually when u lift off the throttle when shifting...if you shift too fast it will either jerk a bit or cause some clutch slip if you let out the clutch gradually so when normally driving I shift rather slowly to allow a better matching of RPMs before letting clutch out....