I have a habit of rev-matching almost every time I slow for a stoplight and whatnot, and I've noticed that I over rev the thing a little now. Also, I can shift absolutely seamlessly now, which is suprising. It takes a bit of concentration, but I'll master it within a week probably. And I haven't noticed any problem with launching the car, either. The engine feels more eager to go at any rpm, and I don't really have to rev it higher to go.
But man, the Honda Rev is difficult now. You guys know the one.
Anyway, the story of the install. You have to remove the intake to reach the bolts on the top of the tranny. Underneath, you have to pull the halfshaft out of the transmission, and on the driver's side we just unbolted the intermediate shaft. Removing the tranny is pretty darn easy, since it only weighs but 70 pounds or so. You have to back it off of the splines by wiggling it, then turn it counter-clockwise about 30 degrees to clear a bracket, pull it all the way off, then just set it on the ground. Unbolting the old diaphragm and flywheel is as simple as a few screws. Bolting the new stuff on is a similar piece of cake. The hardest part is lifting the tranny and holding it in the right spot (the tranny jack just held the weight, but we had to position it by hand) and lining up all the bolts. But then we had a problem.
Everything was installed. We started up the car on the lift and heard an awful rattling, shaking sound. It went away during idle, but when the engine began to rev or started to drop revs the sound happened again. We ran through a few gears slowly--it all worked--but the sound still happened when the engine "changed direction". We spent nearly 2 hours with the help of another tech diagnosing the problem. It wasn't the slave cylinder or it's fork. It wasn't the throwout bearing. We figured it might be, so we removed the slave cylinder to look at the bearing, but all was well. The only other inspection plates on the housing are the starter and underneath at the flywheel. Instead of leaning to the back of the engine we decided to go underneath to the flywheel. We thought one of its dowels may have pushed through and been hitting something.
This sound could have been a bottom end rod knock. It was loud. One word kept running through our minds, and that was backlash. But what? We turned the crank with a breaker bar and watched as the flywheel was delayed. When we changed direction it knocked. We moved it with our fingers and it was loose, clanging back and forth. The bolts were torqued during install. Key word "were". There's a large counterbore on the rear of the wheel that presses onto the crankshaft, and that wasn't fitted over the crank properly. The bolts were torqued, but the wheel was in a bind. When we jolted it by starting the motor, the wheel was banged out of the bind and went onto the crank as it should've been. But now all out bolts that were tight were now loose, and quite loose.
We disassembled everything once more and reinstalled once more, taking another 3 hours, which was better than the 4 the first time. There was no damage to anything, and now it's all in perfect working order. We left the dealership right at 10 pm.
And now I know how it put a clutch in my car and what possible problems to look for. W00t!
New flywheel and clutch assembly:
Old flywheel and clutch disc:
Scratches, scrapes, chunks and cracks!?!?! How the hell did it work!?!?
And for your entertainment, my exhaust:
And all the VTEC smoke that doesn't make it to the cars behind me:
All good now though!
👍
