How are you guys removing the upper bolts on the bell housing? Everything is going well, but the LS7 setup is a bit thicker than the stock LS6 setup, so I am stumped on the removal of those upper bell housing bolts. Any advice or help would be great. Thanks.

Micah

 

Same problem here.
I did not manage to get those bolts out.

Perhaps your vendor has an alternative solution

but I partially trimmed back the "locating pins" on the flywheel with a grinder.

They are substantially longer than they need to be.

Once trimmed back equally, the LS7 assembly will fit without removing the upper bellhousing.


Dave

 

Long extension (like 18-24 inches) and a universal adapter will get them out. If you have air, its a bunch easier..... but you can do it with hand tools.

 

Appreciate the suggestions. From my research it loks like the "shaving or tapping" the guide pins is a common practice.

Micah

 

Longer the extention the better.

 

I bought a dedicated 15mm wobble socket just for this use. Every extension in my toolbox clicked together plus this makes the job as easy as can be.

 

I can see no reason to do that....Ive done 2 clutch jobs on my Z06 now without any real issues.

 

Well, I attempted to utilize my extensions...did not fair well, so I shaved the guide pins and it went in like a glove. Now we are having tough times lining everything up and getting the torque to mate with the pilot bearing/crank.

We will be back at it tomorrow.

Micah

 

Be careful with that pilot bearing-mess that little devil
up,and you get to do everything again.
I went with a Kevlar bushing on my second go-round...

 

How dd you mess it up?

 

ok, Im confused.... In the first post you asked about removal of the bolts at the top of the bell housing.... How did shaving the guide pins help to get those out? Im not trying to be argumentative, I just dont get it.

 

It can get messed up while trying to stab the pilot shaft into the bearing. If its not in line or very very close to being in line, the possiblity exists that you can screw up the little cage that holds the roller bearings.

 

It has to slide in at the same height/pitch/angle as the flywheel/p/plate /pilot bearing.

 

And it doesn't have to be very far off,either-if it doesn't go in easy,don't force it...

 

Ok, I was not successful in getting the top two bolts off of the bell housing, so I found a couple of post where guys too the fly wheel and shaved/cut down the three guide pins on the fly wheel. This provided, just enough room to all the clutch to slip in and mount onto the flywheel and prevented me from screwing with the top two bolts.

As for the pilot bearing...we got everything lined up the best we could and pushed things in as far as we could until we got the c-clamp on and pulled things forward enough to get bolts started and tighten it all down. We finish up tomorrow by re-installing the exhaust and taking the car out for a spin.

I am doing my car in a couple of weeks and have noted somethings that I am going to do to make it faster and easier in getting things done.

Micah

 

......you'll eventually regret that decision. It should slide together, if not, something is not aligned properly.

 

Did not the read all the posts but my input here for bellhousing bolts, is you need 18-20" extension with 1/4" drive swivel/universal/flex socket 13mm for sure, i had swivel 3/8" drive too but could not use, 1/4" flex socket with long extension.

For pilot bearing removal, i had to tap couple threads (not much room there) and used long and bigger slide hammer and use all my muscle as much as i can...that is phuckin biach let me tell ya, hope you have more muscle than me but i was exhausted.

To install my buddy tool and die maker make a nice socket to install new one, it was a piece of cake.

If pilot bearing is good check with good bright light, than dont mess with it, they are roller needle bearings and dont damage easy.

Dont use C-clamp to insert input shaft, its a 2 man job, one has to be infront and other has to push whole rearend assembly from back upon front person feedback to push/pull, up/down...while doing this watch the brake lines near shifter hole area, TT might hit and could easily snap those lines, i use flat thin plate bought from home depot insert between brake lines and TT and keep watching this area as you moving forward whole assembly.

2 people makes big difference specially doing this install on jack stand. GL

 

Couple of things that worked really well for me.

Just took my time using a decent "spirit level" and got the vertical face of the bell housing perpendicular to the torque tube and the torque tube parallel to the floor - the drive shaft popped in without a fight (required only gentle encouragement from a couple of C clamps).

This tool below was a FREE loaner from Auto Zone. Took about 20 seconds to remove the Pilot bearing.

 

I appreciate all of the recommendations, suggestins, comments and "you are going to regret" remarks. Problem with this all is, everyone has "their" way of doing it and we did the c-clamp method. I am really hoping that everything just played friendly and we are going to be fine, but that will only be determined this afternoon when we start it up and drive it. I am doing my car in a couple of weeks and I already know that I am doing some things different.

 

I actually used a longer set of extensions and took the upper bolts out by ratcheting through the top from the shifter hole. It took about 2-3' of extensions, but, worked for me and was more of a direct shot