944 S2 Clutch
Saturday I headed over to the headquarters of the infamous KCWS and helped some good friends do a clutch job on a 944 S2 Cab. The car had died abruptly with no power getting to the rear wheels, so I figured the clutch center had blown out. The car has about 90k ish miles on it.
Up in the air and ready to go. Everything behind the engine block needs to come out. Transaxle, torque tube (slide back), bellhousing, and exhaust.
KCWS ladder. We hit a snag right away at the transaxle coupler on the torque tube. The rear most bolt was absolutely seized. While the allen wanted to bite, with a huge breaker bar on it, it would eventually start to slip. So I sat there for about a half hour with a hammer and chisel working through a small opening trying to knock the bolt counter clockwise. Finally it let go and I got it out. What appears to have happened, was someone had been in here before, tightened the front bolt first, then when they put the rear bolt in, it was not sitting in the groove perfectly, and they ran it in with an impact gun, stripping the threads. Ugly. Instead, you should start both bolts in the coupler so they are lined up perfectly, then tighten them down.
After awhile, we were in to the clutch housing.
The original rubber center disc was completely falling apart.
What is missing? The safety “get home” tabs that are designed to limp you home when the center fails is missing.
Here is the get home tab that should be welded to the disc.
Should be like this.
Mike looks shocked, lol.
And the new clutch disc. The rubber centers are not available anymore, and is updated to a spring center.
And of course, we can’t have a party without having brats and ribs!
Scott and Mike getting the axles hooked back up.
All in all it was a good day. Good turn out of people, awesome weather, and great food!
2 Comments
Leave a commentRalph Heady
November 9, 2012 at 11:09 AM
My Porsche 944 S2 Cabriolet, like the one shown, just came to a stop. Motor runs, no movement. With the pictures of your clutch showing the rubber on the disc and the limp home tabs, I now know what happened to mine. I heard a clunking noise that I thought was in the tranny. I now believe the clunking I heard was the limp home tabs on my clutch. Being new to owning a Porsche, I had no clue there was rubber in the drivetrain. A car of the 90’s with no springs in the clutch disc? American clutches have been sprung since the 60’s. With only 70,000 miles on the car, I believe the original clutch is still there. Thank you for the pictures. Not having a hoist or a host of friends and with winter coming on, I will send this to a shop.
Any experience to share with what clutch is best or acceptable. I am looking at a SPEC grade 2 with kevlar disk. Any help would be appreciated.
How many miles were on the clutch? The disc you removed appears to have plenty of wear left.
porschedoc
November 9, 2012 at 12:07 PM
Hi Ralph,
They used the rubber center disc to help dampen drive train vibrations. Cars are not really designed to go past the 8-10 year/100k mile mark, even today. Today, even BMW states the lifespan of a new car off the lot is 100k miles. After 20 years, rubber is going to disintegrate, so that is a pretty good lifespan of a clutch, no matter what mileage is on it. Now, with that being said, they no longer offer the rubber disc, and have moved to a spring centered hub like the turbo cars had. For a mildly driven street car (no clutch drops, banging the shifter through the gears, etc) I would recommend sticking with a sachs clutch kit. If you move to a spec, you will lose a little drive ability in the clutch release/take off. If you are ok with that, then go for it, it will be a more durable clutch in regards to abuse.