pressure plate crapped out

[Bruce2]

The short arm (73mm) was used on transmissions with 16mm dia cross shafts until VW went to the larger 19mm cross shaft. That larger cross shaft used a 90mm long arm, increased to 100mm a year or 2 later. There never was a 73mm long, 19mm dia arm installed on a T1 (that's a late Bus arm) I believe the larger dia cross shaft appeared in 72. I did not know the exact year the clutch changed, but I knew it was right about then.

The clutch arm in my Samba ad is the 100mm long arm to fit a 16mm cross shaft. Such an arm was never equipped on USA delivered cars.

[Marc]

Thanks. I thought you'd said something like that in various past posts, good to have it all in one place.
The 200mm covers were coil-spring through the 1969 model year and went to diaphragm for the last year of the early-style TOB (P/N 311 141 025E) and so far as I know there was no change made in the control system for the diaphragm covers - you just had to run a little more freeplay with it to make sure that it wasn't being overtravelled.
If the pedal starts to get light near the bottom of the pedal travel it's getting ready to invert the cover, which could cause the kind of damage that bones had...so his parts guy isn't out of line if the clutch was adjusted too tight - but that's hard to prove after the fact.

[bones]

The pedal travel was not light at the bottom of pedal travel. Actually just the opposite, pedal feel was heavier at the bottom of pedal travel and this occurred all of a sudden. There were other problems with the x shaft as I mentioned above so the pressure to over compress the pp couldn't have happened due to all the fore / aft free play in the x shaft bushings and sleeve. As the pedal was depressed and the x shaft contacted the PP the slop in the sleeve and bushings was so great that the force generated was insufficient to compress the pp. After the motor was out and before removing the x shaft there was at least 1/2 - 3/4 inch of fore aft freeplay and one could move the x shaft toward the pp with 1 finger because the sleeve was rotating in the tranny and the bushings were shot. therefore if I could move the x shaft so easily how could the force through the x shaft be great enough to compress let alone over compress the PP. BTW the return spring on the lever was new. there was just a ton of slop in there.

Now after replacing the PP, x shaft bushings and sleeve there is no play fore and aft and it takes stout effort to move the xshaft by hand as if it were compressing the pp. BTW the clutch pedal travel is adjusted as it was previously with the old pp(as I've done for 30 years) and works just fine. I need to replace the front mount however as that is where the tranny is moving a tad and causing a little chatter despite the berg intermediate mount. the new pp is a 1700 kennedy and with the short arm there is considerably more effort required to depress the clutch pedal than on my late model ghia with the longer arm and same pp. That's the merit of what Bruce has come up with concerning the old and new type pp and their applications.

[Bruce2]

John just PM'd me the quote where a reference was made to the compatibility of the various stock parts. Here's the link:

http://www.shoptalkforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=90044

In that reply John C at aircooled.net stated that you shouldn't use the late long hook at the front pedals with the short arm at the trans. Although I haven't personally tested this combo, I can say that combo will create the greatest stroke at the TO bearing possible, and require the most pedal effort.

Marc, What cars and when did the change happen from the early short hook to the longer hook at the front pedals?

[Marc]

Because of the inherent cable-travel loss in the funky pulley setup on my mid-engine trike, it's a real challenge to get full disengagement with even minimal freeplay. Someday I'll either switch over to hydraulic or incorporate a teeter-totter setup like I've used in mid-engine racecars. For now, I've chopped ~8mm out of the stock early `72 lever to gain 10%. The improvement is noticeable but it's still not perfect; if I have time before I head to Sturgis I may try again making the lever 20-25% shorter. I've already done all I can at the pedal to increase the cable travel there, if I have to re-engineer that I may as well just take the plunge and go hydraulic.

[Ol'fogasaurus]

a mistake post. Deleted

Lee

[Marc]

Did you have the flywheel machined?

Not the issue here, it's just the funky clutch cable linkage. It uses a 3-ft-long Bowden tube-like sheath cabbaged from some Detroit P.O.S. to cross the cable over from the pedal on the left to the two pulleys needed to come at the mid-engine trans' lever on the right, and some cable travel is lost along the way from the flexure of the sheath. I do know of a better way to do this, used successfully on mid-engine racecars I've built, just haven't had the ambition to revamp it when the sun's out and I'd rather be riding
For now, I've removed the travel stop from the clutch pedal and made a new attachment point for the cable as far from the fulcrum as possible...but when the clutch is hot, I still need to put my heel on the pedal to shove it a few extra inches when I need to get into Reverse; that places extra strain on the cable due to it having to wrap around the pedal's hub, but fortunately it's a rare occurrence. Crude but effective
The new 1849cc engine's getting a Kennedy Stage One which will probably exacerbate the problem, but with the limited time available before I head to South Dakota I probably won't get around to doing more than making an even shorter lever. It's not like it's a problem on the highway, just an annoyance at fuel stops

[Ol'fogasaurus]

That is weird! The post was not to be sent and it disappeared when I was trying to delete it. The pictures I was getting were pretty poor if they showed up at all. I looked at the string to see if it posted and not there. I looked the next day and nothing but the pictures showed up and the one with the angle on the fingers which was not there... was. Too late to change it but I will delete it if it does show up on my laptop. It didn't on my tablet.

Thanks Marc.

Lee

[Marc]

...Marc, What cars and when did the change happen from the early short hook to the longer hook at the front pedals?

The 113 721 305B was used from 5/64 until `72 when the longer 113 721 305C took its place (change coincided with the longer release lever on the trans)...I believe that was in 10/71 after VIN 1x2 2076 466

[Marc]

...Marc, What cars and when did the change happen from the early short hook to the longer hook at the front pedals?

The 113 721 305B was used from 6/64 (VIN 6 465 663) until `72 when the longer 113 721 305C took its place (change coincided with the longer release lever on the trans)...I believe that was in 10/71 after VIN 1x2 2076 466
http://www.bugstuffonline.com/images/im ... 21305b.jpg
http://www.piersideparts.net/mm5/graphi ... 21305C.jpg

The 113 721 305A used through 5/64 was also short but had a little dogleg built into the hook to move it inboard to line up with the conduit location of the early cars: https://www.bugeyed.net/images/source/113721305A.jpg