Those running the Tim Zimmer ACT/SB clutch combo...quetions/feedback please

[turboglenn]

Since going AWD i cooked my ACT 2600pp and RPS street disk FAST (under 5k miles fast) so i'm looking at something new... in a way i want a twin but in some ways i've been told i don't want one, and i also have my own reasons for not buying one already (financial that is)

So i was wondering about the combos Tim offers on his site with the ACT pressure plates and the south bend ( i think it is) friction disks in kevlar or ceramic (gonna have to go look again to be sure)

Anyway, can some of you running this combo please give me some feed back on it for DD use (my car is 99% DD) but how well it holds up and grabs under some abuse ( i like to drive hard a lot though too)

a twin is like 1300 bucks, but a TZ combo and flywheel (fidnaza i want cause i liked my last one) can be had for about 700 bucks leaving me room to spare for other goodies i may find/want/need at the last minute).

I just want something that will grip good, handle 550-600hp and 400 - 450lb/ft torque, and can handle being launched/slipped without dieing an early death, but i don't want the thing to chatter and shake my car apart either.. I thoughtabout another 2600PP with a sprung 6 puck but Tim seems to advise against that and i trust anything that man speaks confidently about since he's been there and done that when it comes to going fast in DSM's

cane anyone give me a suggestionon which combo on his site would be best fo my goals, driving style and to not have to mess with it much/ever or not have to modify anything on the fork/arm like you do with twin plates (some of them anyway)

your EXPERIENCES and recomendations from experience will be apreciated, thanks!

EDIT; okay, mayeb they're not ACT SB hybrids, just pure south bend, but i was wantig the 3rd MAYBE or the 4th one down on this page for sure... not sure about the third ones 2200lb PP, although he says it's a good one to go with, but i don't want a leg killing 2900 lb'er either

http://www.tmzperformance.com/Mitsubishi%20SBC%20Clutch%20Kits.html

 

[Lofty]

I have a TMZ Kevlar full faced disk with the titanium hub and an ACT 2100.
This clutch disk is FANTASTIC. It grips just right, and is perfect for daily driven cars. I pulled the disk after 5000 miles or so of abuse maybe, and showed it to Tim, and it looks brand new still, with perfect wear-in on the kevlar.

Honestly, I wouldn't go with another disk. The driveability lies all within the pressure plate for the most part, the disk is decently grabby, but I love the way it reacts to everyday driving.

Buy a southbend! Trust me!


--Scott

 

[twicks69]

Glenn, I would go with the SBC SS-series pressure plate and TZ/B Kevlar/Ceramic clutch disk with a media blasted pressure plate friction surface with a Mitsubishi OEM TOB. I posted up details regarding this clutch in the other clutch thread you started.

 

[donniekak]

This is what happened to the last southbend disk in my car. Running an ss pressure plate, launching regularly, and making enough torque to break second gear, and then stripping the teeth off of the intermediate shaft a couple months later. In all fairness, i beat my car, and the disk still lasted about 8 months.

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Held enough torque to do this.

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It never slipped, and i actually loved the way it felt. But that is an odd failure, and i thought i'd seen them break every way possible.

 

[twicks69]

Well, that looks like a DXD-F sprung hub feramic 6-puck. It will grab. The limiter snapped probably from alot of hard clutch drops by the looks of it. The shockload would also cause the gear failure you experienced.

 

[donniekak]

Well, that looks like a DXD-F sprung hub feramic 6-puck. It will grab. The limiter snapped probably from alot of hard clutch drops by the looks of it. The shockload would also cause the gear failure you experienced.

It was a great clutch. It lasted longer than most, and held great.

People that know me know how i drive my dsm. And they also know i don't get upset at all when things break, because of how i use the car. In all three cases i described, i was driving it the next day anyway.

I just thought that was an odd failure, being the only disk that failed in this manner. Although it may have done this because of the semi enclosed springs. Most sprung disks fail in my car due to the springs popping out. My guess is the secure springs allowed the next failure mode to pop up.

 

[twicks69]

Yup, I agree. Usually you see the limiters beaten apart from clutch dumps or on too harsh of a clutch disk setup. Sometimes it is a defective part, but it looked like the springs were definitely "working" , and the energy had to be transferred somewhere.

 

[Artago]

Glenn, I would go with the SBC SS-series pressure plate and TZ/B Kevlar/Ceramic clutch disk with a media blasted pressure plate friction surface with a Mitsubishi OEM TOB. I posted up details regarding this clutch in the other clutch thread you started.

I have the SS-TZ. Love it. No problems so far.

 

[PieEyedPiper]

Tim, could you please go into further detail about media blasting the pp surface?

 

[twicks69]

Tim, could you please go into further detail about media blasting the pp surface?

By media blasting the pressure plate friction surface, you are increasing the surface porosity of a material and changing the surface from a super smooth/polished finish to a rougher, yet still smooth surface finish. This microscopic change to the surface porosity increases the bedding in capabilities of a kevlar friction material or a cerametallic friction material for faster break-in procedure. With kevlar, it allows the friction material to bed into the pressure plate friction surface (on a full kevlar disk with a steel flywheel, you would also media blast the flywheel friction surface) which will allow it to retain a usable friction surface when you do heavy clutch slipping (aka launches) so it doesn't glaze the friction surfaces. If it glazes the friction surfaces, it will slip after you do a launch, which will require the clutch to be cooled down and re-bedded (break the clutch back in all over again).

Kevlar friction material clutch disks work by having kevlar material bedded into the metal friction surface so that the kevlar disk can "grab" resulting in positive clutch engagement. When the kevlar disk has a smooth polished friction surface that it is engaging against, it will not "grab" thus resulting in the clutch slipping issue and you are then only relying on the clamping pressure of the pressure plate for holding any sort of torque. The friction coefficient simply isn't there as it isn't bedded into the surface and the kevlar won't work the way it is designed. The only way to make a kevlar disk work properly is by having it bedded into its friction surface, then it will retain its designed friction coefficient and the clutch will then have its torque capacity it was designed for.

Regarding cerametallic friction material (Quarter Master street friction material comes to mind), it also works better with a rougher surface finish for the cerametallic friction pads to break in quicker. Otherwise, the result will be the potential for glazing of the friction pads and slipping of the clutch under load. This will be more predominant with a very light flywheel as well as the inertia is simply not there with a heavy vehicle like a stock-weight DSM or Evo. To make it work properly, a heavier flywheel with a higher inertia, media blasted friction surfaces for the pressure plate, floater plate and flywheel friction surface will make the cerametallic street friction disks last longer and shorten the break-in time required for the friction type. This was an issue I saw with several stock-weight Evo's running the QM twin disk with the street frictions earlier in the year at the Shootout. Their clutch was slipping from too smooth of a friction surface on the parts that were engaging the cerametallic friction disks and they were having issues with streetability and lurching from too light of a flywheel for the vehicle weight and power levels.

I could go on and on regarding clutches, friction materials per application, fixes for each type of material, MOI's, clutch weights per vehicle weight applications, etc., but there so many variables per each customer's application that I simply recommend a custom setup per customer application, power goals, driver style, vehicle weight, streetability goals, etc.

Personally, the best luck I have seen from the SBC units in the last few years has been from the full-face kevlar clutch disk (TZ-Series) with media blasted friction surface on the pressure plate and flywheel friction surface, along with the full-face kevlar/ceramic segmented clutch disk (TZ/B-Series) with media blasted friction surface on the pressure plate side and a normal surface finish on the flywheel side. The TZ/FE is a thicker disk due to the inherent nature of the friction lining from SBC for the Feramic material and with the curved marcels on the disk make it engage smoothly but have the potential for dragging the clutch disk on the flywheel side causing the issue with friction welding the Feramic surface to the flywheel resulting in destroying the disk and the flywheel friction surface. It also happens when the driver is extremely abusive on the Feramic material and it gets overheated, then it will either delaminate the friction material or weld itself to the friction surface. The way to get around this, is by running an SBC pressure plate with a stock flywheel or ACT streetlite flywheel with a 0.612" step height and running the OFE or TZ/FE clutch disk, and making sure you are getting total disengagement from the clutch hydraulic assembly.

What I have been recommending instead of the TZ/FE clutch disk is the TZ/B or full ceramic segmented clutch disk (DXD-B) as the ceramic material isn't ferrous and will not weld itself to the friction surface. It is also substantially longer lasting than the Feramic under daily use, especially in stop/go traffic.

So, here is a list of disk options I normally sell:

Organic
TZ-Series (Full face sprung hub Kevlar disk)
OFE-Series (Full face sprung hub Organic/Feramic disk)
TZ/FE-Series custom (Full face sprung hub Kevlar/Feramic disk)
TZ/B-Series custom (Full face sprung hub Kevlar/segmented Ceramic disk)
DXD-B Series (full face sprung hub segmented Ceramic disk)
DXD-F Series (6-puck sprung hub Feramic disk)

The ones I have had the least issues with are the TZ, OFE, TZ/B and DXD-B disks. The TZ/FE and DXD-F simply require full disengagement of the clutch and usage of the SBC pressure plate to guarantee that there won't be an issue with the clutch. Regarding the TZ/FE disks, there was a small batch produced earlier in the year that had too thick of a Feramic friction lining causing partial disengagement issues resulting in friction material welding itself to the flywheel, or the customer couldn't get the clutch to disengage at all. I am sure that there are clutch hydraulic variables in place that make this issue happen as well, but I had to do Warranty return/replacements on a handful of ones that had issues. We are talking about less than 2% of my personal clutch sales, all for DSM's in a single year.

 

[bastarddsm]

What the life on one of the kevlar units on a car making 500whp, and driving it like donnie? I've had great luck with my el cheapo XTD's I get about 8k out of them with 4k of that being drag strip passes. I've never had one slip, or break.

But if I could go two years without changing a clutch, it would be nice

 

[turboglenn]

Wow, thanks everyone, and especially you Tim for taking the time to make these suggestions. I now think instead of a twin i'll be contacting you to order one of your combos (or at leat order through you to show some support for the time you've taken here and in the past to help me out)

I think i'd really benefit pain-wise from a lighter PP, and i can media blast it here at the home-shop. I was mainly concerned with holding ability and life-span of the friction disk material

Thanks again everyone, I now know what to get and feel confident taking a step away from my standard ACT route (always use them because they've honestly never let me down i just down like the extreme effortat the pedal andthe fact they kill slave nad master cylinders like clockwork)

 

[twicks69]

No problem man!

I agree, the higher capacity pressure plates really do blow clutch hydraulics like clockwork. I would replace the master and slave EVERY time I replaced an act 2600 setup in my car. It would normally split the inner piston seals on both cylinders.

As for clutch life on a 500whp car, I got over 30K miles on the TZ disk with a SS-X 2600# pressure plate (or act 2600) with complete streetability.

 

[PieEyedPiper]

Thanks for the in-depth explanation, Tim. Just a couple other questions. Is the reason for your suggestion of the ACT flywheel because it is chromoly? And what size media is being used for the blasting? Is it hard to perform this operation correctly?

 

[twicks69]

Thanks for the in-depth explanation, Tim. Just a couple other questions. Is the reason for your suggestion of the ACT flywheel because it is chromoly? And what size media is being used for the blasting? Is it hard to perform this operation correctly?

You can use a 60-grit or 90-grit aluminum oxide blast media for getting the surface finish you want.

As for Chromoly steel vs. aluminum flywheels with a carbon steel friction insert recommendation is mainly based upon the issue of thermal dissipation and different rates of thermal expansion of the different materials. The thin friction plate on an aluminum flywheel is more prone to warpage causing disengagement issues and uneven clutch friction wear than a solid steel flywheel. As well, aluminum flywheels that are used with twin disk clutches is probably the dumbest thing you can do if you are doing any sort of launching or heavy clutch preloading. The aluminum flywheels will have so much thermal expansion that it will actually deform the pressed-on steel flywheel ring gear under extreme thermal environments. Since Kevlar, Bronze Ferrometallic and Ceramic (or Cerametallic) materials have a high temperature range, there is the potential for warpage of the flywheel friction surface on two-piece flywheels. The stock flywheel, or aftermarket steel flywheels are ideal with the high temperature friction materials for the best longevity.

The drawback to the super smooth machined surface on the ACT flywheel out of the box is the problem that the surface grain structure is not porous enough to retain friction material, hence the recommendation for media blasting it when you are using a cerametallic friction or Kevlar or Carbon friction material. The friction surface works fine with bronze ferrometallic, Feramic, Ceramic, and Organic materials.

If you are using a two-piece aluminum flywheel with almost any clutch on a car like ours with any sort of real abuse, there would still be the high likelyhood of warping the replacement friction surface. I think I replaced my friction surface around 5 or 6 times within 2-3 years; pretty much anytime I had the trans off for a rebuild or a clutch replacement, I would replace the friction material as they were ALWAYS warped when removed from the flywheel itself.

 

[turboglenn]

Tim, got the info on how to order in your PM, thanks! Now i've got to think about flywheels and make a decision on that. but i do have a question for ya

with the PP and disk you reomended for me, how it it's disengagement compared to say a plain full face ACT2600?

I like my ACT but i'd prefer something that didn't have such a fine line of dragging causing shifting issues or slowing shiftingdown, and definitely don't want anything that might require bandaids like longer slave rods and such

would i maybe be better with a sprung puck disk at all?


My ACT isn't bad, but it does slow my shifting a bit unless i have it perfectly setup, and like today i had to replace a crush washer on the slave and spent too long (and need to tweak it a tad more yet) to get it to shift like it did before i replaced the washer (was shifting perfect but had a slow leak i wanted to fix) and now after buttoning up some other thngs the car is a monster compared to yesterday and now i'm dealing with setting up the ACT all over again because it's wanting to drag and i don't like driving it untill i get it perfect to prevent wear onthe trrans

 

[airmail96]

Awesome information is this thread, has me a little worried since I just picked up a TZ/FE, but I'm sure it will be fine. Hopefully you get what you want Glenn.

 

[twicks69]

Awesome information is this thread, has me a little worried since I just picked up a TZ/FE, but I'm sure it will be fine. Hopefully you get what you want Glenn.

There has been very few failures of the Feramic friction material welding itself to the surface of the flywheel. It is normally from improper clutch diesengagement or extreme abuse causing it to fail. In a few occasions it was simply failure due to manufacturing as they used the wrong thickness friction lining on a couple disk assemblies.

You should have nothing to worry about, just get a hold of myself or SBC if there is an issue and it can be worked out.

 

[9!'clipseDOHC]

Just about 6 months ago I switched to the SB SS Pressure plate and SB TZ/FE disk with the ACT flywheel which replaced my old ACT 2100 street disk and Fidanza flywheel combo. The SB has less pedal pressure and holds more torque. Win, win.

 

[airmail96]

Good to hear. Thanks for the responses, sorry for the brief hi-jack glenn.