Clutch Change-How-To.

[jasper5]

Before you attempt the job, make sure you have a decent sized trolly jack, axle stands, a scissor jack, a couple of blocks of wood and a good sized tool kit, including a full set of metric spanners and sockets, a big socket (35mm, I think) for the hub nuts, a couple of big, flat blade screwdrivers, a pair of mole grips, a wire brush (electric or otherwise) and an allen key for the anti-roll bar link rods (4mm or 4.5mm). A long socket bar or a T bar with a section of pipe to help undo the driveshaft nuts, a torque wrench if you want to do the job by the book in terms of tightening bolts.A can of WD40, a 2lb hammer and maybe a ball joint splitter, but it's not essential.A clutch alignment tool or follow my instructions for lining the clutch up, a container to drain the oil into.Oh, and something comfortable to lie on and a dust mask for the clutch dust.

Before starting work, follow all health and safety guidelines and if you follow any of my instructions, do so at your own risk.

To save time with rusted nuts, use the wire brush on the ends of the anti-roll bar link rod mounting nuts, shock absorber bolts, and any rusty nuts that look like they may need removing, then let them soak in WD40, might be useful to do this a few days before you intend to start the job.

If you want to keep the car's electrics energised to avoid losing radio codes and such, plug in one of those tools with a battery fitted, into the cigar lighter, then remove the battery, and if it can be removed, the battery tray.

Under the bonnet......

Remove the air filter box and connected pipework completely, then remove all electrical connections connected to the gearbox, (reverse light switch, speed sensor, etc.).

Remove the clutch slave cylinder or cable if yours has a cable, keep the hydraulic pipe connected and use an elastic band to hold the operating rod into the cylinder.

Remove all the bolts connecting the gearbox to the engine, including the starter motor bolts and any earthing wires.

Lever off any gear linkage parts that you can see under the bonnet, they may be tight, and remove any brackets that may be fitted to the gearbox under the bonnet for the gear linkages or cables.

When you are convinced that there are no more bolts to undo or parts to remove from under the bonnet, move on to undoing the driveshaft nuts.

With the car on the ground, (steel wheels), take out the locking pins from the driveshaft nuts and using the long socket bar or T bar with a piece of pipe, undo the driveshaft nuts, (you may need to stand on the socket bar and force your weight onto the socket bar to undo the nut, hence the piece of pipe to extend the socket bar.Once undone, remove the nuts and tap lightly on the end of the driveshaft to make sure it moves freely, (dont hammer it hard or you will damage the thread, ideally, put the nut back on a couple of threads to try to avoid damage).
With alloy wheels, undo the wheel nuts, jack up the car and remove a wheel, if you have a steel spare, fit it and follow the above, otherwise, screw back in the wheel bolts and use a crowbar or something to fit behind the bolts and wedge it on the floor, now you can undo the big nut because the crowbar stops the hub from turning.

With the driveshaft nuts undone, jack up the car and fit some axle stands, be sure they are safely mounted.

Remove the undertray and fit your scissor jack, mounted on the wooden blocks, under the sump or something solid like the exhaust, be sure no damage will occur to the exhaust, fit the scissor jack near the gearbox side of the sump.

Drain off the gearbox oil.

Next remove one nut from the anti-roll bar link rods (each side) and remove the link rod away from the shock absorber.

To remove the shock absorber on the 406, my preffered method is to take out the bolt at the bottom of the shock absorber tube (16mm nut with a square on the other bolt side), squirt WD40 around the bottom of the shocker tube and where the bolt came from, taking care not to damage the abs or brake pad warning wires, hit the top of the hub carrier (behind the brake disc on the solid ledge), keep knocking downward until the shock absorber tube can be removed, (you may need to lever down on the bottom suspension arm).With the shocker tube removed, take out the driveshaft from the back of the hub and pull the driveshaft out of the gearbox, this applies to both sides and both driveshafts.

Some may prefer to undo the bottom ball joint nut and remove the bottom ball joint, I find removing the shocker tube easier.When you refit the tube, line up the peg that sticks out from the tube, with the slot where the bolt fits in.

With the driveshafts removed, go under the car and remove anything else connected to the gearbox or between the engine and gearbox, like the tin plate behind the flywheel or gearbox to engine bolts, gear linkages etc.

Jack up the gearbox until it is just being lifted by the jack and remove the gearbox mounting completely.

If all the bits connected to the gearbox are removed, lower the scissor jack a little and lower the trolley jack a little, you may need to clear the passengers side inner wing with the gearbox, by lowering it.

Using a large flat blade screwdriver, carefully lever the gearbox away from the engine, then wheel it back on the trolley jack until it is able to be lowered away from the engine.

Remove the clutch from the flywheel by undoing the 6 bolts holding the pressure plate to the flywheel.(If changing the flywheel, remove it now).

Part 2 tomorrow.

I hope this isn't too long winded.

[steve_earwig]

Do I have to read all that with no pretty pictures?

[djheath]

Nice work. I think I still have a pic of the reverse light switch mechanism wiring. It's useful as it took me ages to work out how to pull the wires off the connector as you cant see it being hidden up high above the driveshaft. I will see if I can get it and stick it on this page if thats ok so you can see where the clip is and what you need to pull to get it off!
EDIT: Here:

in the pick you can just see the clip hidden behind the elecrtical clamp. A pain in the arse to get to without being able to see it!

My other tips from doing this the other day are -
-- With alloy wheels I found the socket fitted through the wheel hub ok and I didn't need to get the spare out to get the leverage. My hub nuts were 36 mm. I think one thing worth doing before you do this job, is to a few days before you attempt it, try and loosen the hub nuts. If you cant get them undone even with a massive breaker bar, then get it down to a tyre place and ask them nicely to loosen the nuts with their air drivers then tighten them up by hand. It will save a lot of hassle.
-- Also check if the drop links are rusted, because they will not undo I bet ya! Best to buy two new ones before hand and grind the old ones off.
-- I didn't remove the battery and just left it connected, but dont know if it would cause a problem on other engine sizes.
-- If you undo the botton ball joint instead of undoing the suspension, make sure you get a massive pickle fork to split the ball joint. Dont bother using one of those splitters with a bolt that you tighten they are crap! Just keep hammering in the fork and eventually it will split the joint. Then put all your weight on the wish bone and pull out the balljoint and swing it away from the drive shat.
-- I had a bit trouble with the right hand drive shaft. Haynes description of those locking eccentric bolts is a bit misleading. Basically undo the two nuts so there is about an inch of thread showing. You should be able to push the bolt through the whole towards the right hand wheel and turn it a bit. If you can do that then you know its loose. Then get your pickly fork out again and put it between the driveshaft bearing housing and the right of the driveshaft and give it a bit of a tap. This helped release the shaft from the bearing housing as it had corroded slightly so was quite stuck in!
-- When trying to refit the drive shafts with the ball joints out, I found the best was was to put the drive shaft in the hub, then on your knees, with both hands push down the wishbone so it springs all the way down and get it below the botton of the balljoint. Then using your chest and an extra hand from somewhere push the hub inwards so the balljoint then goes into the wishbone. You WILL pinch the skin on your fingers and get a blood blister. If you dont, you're not doing it right!
-- If you have standard push release bearing, put it on the gearbox shaft and make sure it locks on. Dont move the gear box leaver if you have a cable gear box, as it can come off and mean you have to get the box out again, if you are half way through fitting it.
-- Best tip as well is to put the clutch plate onto the gear box shaft to make sure it definitely fits and you have the right part, before you fit it to the engine, just to make sure!
-- When removing the gear box or fitting it, note that the differential is very heavy and will tend to make the box fall that way, rotating the box. If you are not a big muscle bound man, like the guy who came and helped me, and you cant just pick the box up in both hands and put it on the engine, then I found the best think is to lift the box with the diff point straight up. It means it will fit in the engine bay a bit better and then once its raised, you can turn it with out too much trouble to get it aligned.
-- Finally its worth fitting two new drive shaft oil seals to the gear box whilst its out. Easy to do, I just used the old seals and an lump hammer to drift the new seals in.


Sorry that's quite a lot of tips! Hope you dont mind!

[jasper5]

Part 2.

When you have removed all the old clutch parts, clean off the flywheel with brake cleaner or similar, then, as dj says, try to fit the clutch plate onto the gearbox shaft, it should slide on easily.Clean the shaft that the release bearing slides on and LIGHTLY grease it, use normal everyday grease, DO NOT USE COPPER SLIP OR COPPER GREASE!!!, then fit the bearing on the release fork, as dj says, make sure the bearing is fitted correctly, then to stop the problem that dj had with the bearing falling off, tie back the release fork so that the bearing cannot slip off if the fork moves.Next, using the special grease that should come with the new clutch,or standard grease, LIGHTLY grease the splines that the clutch slides on, use it sparingly, you do not want to get it on the clutch plate, again, DO NOT USE COPPER GREASE!!!

Fit the clutch to the flywheel, using the alignment tool, making sure the spinner plate is the right way round, if you haven't got an alignment tool, fit the clutch on and lightly tighten the bolts, then line up the edge of the spinner plate in relation to the outer edge of the cover plate, you will be able to tell if it even all the way round by turning the flywheel slowly and tucking it in where required.Tighten up the clutch bolts evenly, think triangles, ie, tighten the bolts in a triangular fashion.

Put the gearbox back onto your trolley jack, taking care to position the jack so that you avoid the problem that dj had with the diff swinging down, select a gear using the gear linkage on the gearbox, this will help when feeling for the splines entering the clutch.

Carefully jack up the gearbox until the gearbox splines are lined up with the centre of clutch pressure plate, then slide the jack and gearbox towards the engine, if you have trouble with the gearbox splines entering the clutch splines, make sure the engine and gearbox are level, if you still struggle fitting the gearbox......fit each driveshaft back into the gearbox....you will see that if you turn the left driveshaft, the right one will turn also, this was why I said select a gear.....hold the right driveshaft or get help to hold it...turn the left shaft and wiggle the box towards the engine until you feel the shaft resist from turning, (this means that the gearbox splines are entering the clutch)...next, then try to push the gearbox onto the engine, push with your feet if neccessary, (some jacking up and down slightly may be required to finally push the gearbox home.

When the gearbox slides onto the engine, bolt all the engine to gearbox bolts up and remove the driveshafts.Fit the gearbox mounting and rebuild everything.

Whilst the driveshafts are removed, it might be a good time to replace the lower engine mount.

Good luck with the job if you are doing it yourself, but take care.

[swiss]

Wow. Who wants to buy me a clutch kit so I can try this out?

[jasper5]

Do I have to read all that with no pretty pictures?

Don't be silly, I'm far too ugly

[teamster1975]

Brilliant post Jasper, thankyou!