The internet can be a great thing. If I need tips on how to cook my steak properly or paint my bathroom, a quick Google search will deliver the information I need. On the flip side, you can find bad information in your search as well. This especially applies to your vehicle. Be cautious on what you read about selecting or using your clutch system based on “tips” found on a forum or social media page. In many cases, the people offering advice have no experience and are really trying to look important!
Here are some of our favorite bad tips found online:
- ‘Take off in second gear at the drag strip. It will cut down on your tire spin’. Well, yes, it probably will. It will also bog the engine (if the clutch is up to the task), and if not, the clutch will slip horribly. Expect to see a plume of smoke from under the car of your buddy who tries this trick.
- ‘Don’t worry about breaking the clutch in, just let ‘er eat!’ A clutch needs to seat properly to give you maximum performance and life. If you back out of the garage, put it on 5000, and dump the clutch, expect slippage, failure, or at the least, greatly reduced clutch life. If you want to learn more about properly breaking a clutch in, check out our blog post.
- ‘I hooked my truck up to a tree, then just slipped the clutch to break it in’. Or, ‘Just pull up against a wall and slip the clutch to get her seated’. It is hard to even comment on these two, but suffice it to say that proper break-in is critical to the clutch’s life, and trying to shortcut or cheat this procedure will cost you down the line.
- ‘Use your traction control at the drag strip to cut down on tire spin.’ Will this work? Maybe, but most traction control systems cycle the brakes and/or engine RPM to do their job, putting an extreme load on the clutch system. Turn off all the engine controls when racing.
- ‘I just slipped my clutch a whole bunch to put heat in it and break it in.’ The process of breaking in a clutch is about systematically seating the friction materials on both sides of the disc to the flywheel and pressure plate, similar to bedding in brakes. Introducing extreme or quick heat to these unseasoned components will cause the components’ to warp, and from there, watch for premature slippage and even non-release from your new clutch system.
- ‘Race cars don’t break in their clutch, and I don’t need to either.’ It’s correct that race cars don’t break in their clutch, but a race clutch is typically seated with higher initial pressure on the first few runs, and then the pressure is backed off to optimize the combination. Also, race clutches get constant maintenance to keep surfaces flat and consistent and maintain repeatable performance. This doesn’t happen with a typical street vehicle.
Do you have any doozies to share? Let us know!