first and foremost: *&^@#$%#@$%#@*$^%#*@$% !!!!!

took my car to the shop yesterday so they could gimme new axles and find out what is wrong with my tranny.....

well, they notice after bleeding the clutch that the new slave cylinder was over exerting itself because the shift fork was at a bad pivot angle ie something is broken. this is the reason i will be putting in a THIRD slave cylinder.

they dropped the tranny and notice that:

throwout bearing is busted
clutch and pressure plate are fried (somehow got too hot)

--my guess is, the TO bearing broke, and i had to drive the car 10 miles home with the clutch engaging at the floor then drive it again today in the same condition frying the clutch in the process.--

something about the shift fork being bent or something or another (ill find out more in the morning)

so it comes down to this:

8hrs labor to drop and install tranny
new clutch system
new TO bearing
new shift fork
2 new axles (130k cv boots were torn for awhile)
----------------------------
$1,170


Trevor

clutch definately got red-hot at some point. the whole thing is purple and blue from the heat.

heres some pics:

in these first pics is the piece where the TO bearing sits, as you can see the lip it sits in is bent all to hell

in this pic is a close up of the pressure plate. it didnt come out too well. in person, the thing is blue and purple.

in these pics you can really see how hot the clutch got from the discoloration

Once again, another ACT induced tranny failure.

Man Trevor, I'm really sorry to hear about all this. With all the bad luck you've been having, you're due to win the lottery or something.


Dave

Wow, that is amazing. Is the clutch worn all to h3ll, or can you still use it. Do you not have someone doing the work for you, like a buddy or something? I don't see how this will be a 1100+ job.....

It looks to me to be an Exedy clutch disk......

I thought ACT used an Exedy clutch plate


Dave

Also Brian V, if it is an ACT clutch, this is a throw-out bearing problem, not an actual clutch problem. You can see that the throw-out bearing wore out and the grease thickened up, creating a ton of friction when the clutch pedal was engaged. And, since the slave cylinder was having to exert so much force to move the fork because of the bad throw-out bearing and grease, it wore itself out, which also explains him going through slave cylinders.

I remember that now lol, I just got . Sorry Brian....

i never had a problem with the act's in my 95 gsx i had. maybe its being the weak tranny in the max's or nissan's in general. who knows!

im all for blaming the fruitcake behind the wheel

clutches n trannies = no luck

Ramius: they quoted 8hrs of labor at $70 or so an hour and when you add in a $270 clutch, $204 for 2 axles, and whatever the TO bearing costs plus fluid thats what it comes to

Dave:I think this happened because the TO bearing failed;not the ACT.

Bryan:





Trevor

that damage has nothing to do with the ACT clutch, just thought I clear that up. My guess was right on the fork was crooked. But little did you know that your clutch was toast.

assembling the tranny in a rush and not assembling the clip to face upward and the other clip that holds the fork in place making the bearing come out of place could have contributed to the damage. Thats just my opinion about this aside from what they said that caused the damage.

Is the clutchdisc supossed to be blue like that??? Or is it blue from the heat???

wow. those colors are nice. the blue and purple work. too bad the clutch doesn't. was that an ACT, Exedy, or Nissan clutch?

the clutch disc is usually that color however the springs should NOT be bright *** blue like that. and the pressure plate was the same way.

bonzelite:ACT clutch. (ACT uses Exedy clutch discs)

I agree it wasn't really the ACT clutch, but doesn't ACT provide the throw out bearing?


Dave

no. mine was from autozone.

so throw-out bearing and pilot shaft bearings must be purchased from the dealer or the auto parts store. the aftermarket hi-performance clutches are just sold as the flywheel, pressure plate and clutch disc. or any combo thereof. is this correct?

My ACT clutch kit came with the disc, pressure plate, Nissan OEM Throw-out bearing, Nissan OEM pilot bearing, and a clutch alignment tool...

BriGuyMax,

thanks for the info. i am on the trail to get a clutch. i have the fidanza flywheel. i am leaning to Exedy.

Oh, I was under the impression ACT gave you everything for the install. My bad. Are you still selling the Max?


Dave

yeah, i'm still selling it but not for awhile because i dont have anything else to drive.

man, got the car back today....this factory clutch is rediculous, it feels like butter compared to the ACT....i hate it!



Trevor

you can get the ACT with just the plate and disc, or you can get it as a kit with everything included.


As for the failure, I would say it's a combination of the AutoZone TO bearing, and the heavy a$$ ACT clutch. I've seen the ACT ruin many TO bearings because it takes so much force to engage the clutch.

Yet another reason to stay away from ACT.

that is why i am going with Exedy. i have heard about ACT. and Centerforce. "Senselessforce" - stay away from that one, too.

hope fully my tranny dosen't blow form my act, my kit came with a t/o bearing.

man how hard were you driving ???

I beat the **** outa my other clutch and the pressure plate didn't look like that, you must of ben doing some serious driving.

it didnt fry from serious driving. it fried because my TO bearing broke causing the shift fork to sit at an angle and engage the clutch improperly.

Yeah my senselessforce had a bad break in and it is a bad clutch aynways so now its dead. I hope that is all that is dead.

96BLUMAX,

hey. i want in on the underdrive pulley for SOHC 3rd gen. how do you get in?

dang. i don't even want to know what my clutch and throwout bearin looking like. I've done about 5-6000miles on it with the t/o bearing making a grinding noise (like its dry). thank goodness i have a replacement waiting to be put in. what actually made the shift fork sit at a bad angle? dont understand that part.

look closely at the "ears" on the TO bearing. you'll notice one of them is bent forward, while the other points almost straight outward. that's because the TO bearing wasn't strong enough to push the pressure plate in, and it bent the ears on it where the shift fork pushes against it.

again, it's probably combination of cheap TO bearing and extremely stiff pressure plate.

Wait...So are ACT clutchs bad for your car? All these manual tranny failures with an ACT are starting to make me think that having an ACT street disk was not such a good idea. How can you make sure that your ACT will have a long lifespan? Also, my ACT grabs really close to the firewall(at about 75% depressed). Do all Max's with ACT's grab really quick, really low?
Thanks,
MassMax

someone with first-hand ACT nightmare experience should sound off soon. as for me, as i have kept my distance from aftermarket clutches until i really know more things, i have discovered on freshalloy.com and the org and zilvia.net that ACT and Centerforce are to be avoided for nissan. i am nearly sold on Exedy. ACT uses Exedy disks however. throw out and pilot shaft bearings should be included with the clutch kit. and i believe those items are just OEM parts. thus far, this is what i know. i already have a Fidanza flywheel.

pretty much what bonzelite just said. the ACTs are just too harsh. miss a shift in them and they engage so harshly, it'll rip the teeth right off the gears.


with the centerforce, they usually start slipping within 6 months of installation.

I'm happy with my LuK clutch so far, but it doesn't grab nearly as hard as the ACT I previously had. I can often chirp 2nd, but never 3rd. with the ACT, chirping 3rd was a common occurence, and 2nd chirped at almost every firm shift. just TOO harsh for our weak trannies.

Matt93SE,

thanks for corrorborating that info. now, to up-the-ante, if you will, why is a single-plate with organic disc preferrable to a single plate with a cera-metallic disc? from my knowledge of this topic so far, i would be willing to bet that the reason is again harshness, ie, the cera-metallic disc is just too harsh, grabs too much. but i am unaware of 'single-plate' and 'double-plate' and 'triple-plate' types, as i see that in advertisements in magazines everywhere. so what is that all about? why is single plate better for our case? is it all about harshness of the engagement?

mostly it's about harshness and wear. a 6 puck metallic clutch will dig into the flywheel and wear out much faster than an organic disc with more surface area. a metallic clutch is using only ~30% of the flywheel's friction surface to grab onto, while the organic uses 95-100% of the area. thus it makes fewer heat spots and is easier on the flywheel itself.

it's just like brake pads at this point. would you rather have a small chunk of metal scraping against your rotors, or a larger piece of "soft" organic material? yeah, the metal will withstand much more, but it also is much harder on the rest of the components.

My act failure..

Matt,

this is good timing. i was intrigued by the 6-puck disk, as it is very "race." but i knew that i needed more knowledge about it. it looks cool and appears a good upgrade, but i have had a vibe that always leaves me full of skepticism. and these ideas are very interesting pieces of information: the main idea is that i want a better, at least equally, performing flywheel/clutch without putting parts onto my car that will only lead to premature failure. i would rather forgo super-gripping force if it only means that i will need to drop the tranny in 6 months, as i drive very aggressively anyway. in my time of learning about modding, i have learned that one cannot mod one thing without affecting or modding another thing, as a car works in systems. and everything, from the vacuum tubes to the tires, are interconnected in an intimate dance. going with a 6-puck Exedy disk will only contradict my cautionary sidestepping of the ACT and Centerforce setups, as that will just invite more problems. therefore, i will go with Exedy, for sure, with the stage one organic setup. and that is the final dialing-in for me, unless you can offer more about the t/o and pilot shaft bearings, ie, OEM or aftermarket. as far as i know, OEM is what is available to us and what is preferred.

same goes for kevlar brake pads: those will grip like a son of a b*tch, but they will dig channels into the rotors very soon. it seems that to achieve superior gripping force without going through rotors so quickly, the actual caliper/rotor should be upgraded to a 4-piston design, like the Z32/Skyline OEM types, to garner greater surface area contact whilst using the traditionial semi-metallics. of course, this entails modification of the actual structural members. i believe Stillen and Brembo make bolt-on kits for the Maxima.