Hi,

I followed several write ups in Corvette Forum about replacing a clutch. I have replaced about 10 clutches in my life but this was the most hassle. Follow the other posts, but I would like to add a few things that I learned.
I didn't lift the car up very high like most people advised; I measured the distance of the rear axle centerline to the ground at 23 inches and it was plenty. The front was similar, maybe a little less.
I also made a small "A" shaped rig to hold the rear of the engine up in place when I removed the torque tube. I used a longer J-bolt at the front to hang the top of the "A" from an existing hole in the chassis.
At the other end of the "A" I used two shorter J-hooks, again using existing chassis holes. I then placed a piece of 3/4 wood across the "A" to support the engine by the oil pan. The rear J-bolts could be fine tuned to get the proper height, without the worry of having another jack under the oil pan. Please do yourself a favor and wrap some cushioning device around the rear J-bolts. I used an old leather glove at each J-bolt. I got a nasty cut on my head within the first hour.
I have some images I will post at the end.
I did remove the Transaxle, suspension, rear sub chassis and torque tube as one piece, but had a lot of trouble putting it together that way.
I used a wooden furniture dolly from Harbor Freight with a few pieces of 2 by 4s and 4 by 4s screwed into the dolly in strategic places to support the transaxle. I used my floor jack under the furniture dolly when it came time to lift. I screwed a piece of plywood with a 5 inch diameter hole cut out to the bottom of the furniture dolly to keep the floor jack centered.
I ended up taking the torque tube off and installing that onto the engine bell housing first and then lifting the transaxle, suspension, and rear sub chassis assembly and bolting to the rear of the torque tube. This is much easier in my opinion.
I replaced my clutch with another OEM type so I wasn't supposed to have trouble with the throw out bearing to clutch pressure plate clearance issues, but since my clutch had 130K miles on it, the self adjusting feature of the throw out bearing took up some space and when I installed the new thicker disk, I thought I lacked the necessary clearance. What I hadn't realized is that the quick disconnect hydraulic fitting had trapped the fluid in both ends of the line. I couldn't get the throw out bearing slave cylinder to compress until I opened the bleed screw and pushed very hard. Then I had plenty of clearance space.
After removing the "Assembly" out from under the car I noticed there was a lot of dirt and grime on the transaxle and where the axle half shafts were removed left an opening for that dirt to enter the differential unit. I went to the hardware store and bought some "Caps" in the copper tube fitting section of the store. They were almost a perfect fit; I had to wrap the outside of the caps with about 1 or 2 turns of duct tape to make a nice seal before washing down the transaxle. The outside diameter of the copper caps were about 1.5 inches, inside diameter was about 1.3 inches. I replaced my differential fluid after driving the car a few miles in case some dirt got in...
When I was installing the torque tube into the clutch assembly I bought some longer bolts and coil springs to help align and push the assembly together while I pushed and wiggled from the rear. As I got closer together, I used progressively shorter bolts, until finally when within about 1/2 inch I installed the original bolt lengths.
Hope this helps someone else.

 

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Thanks for specifying the elevation required to do this, I've wondered about that alot.

 

MXW1...

I like the "A Frame".

Nice write up on the procedural and safety items.

Dave

 

Thanks, hope someone finds it usefull.

 

Thanks for the good write-up and pics. This should help others doing a clutch replacement.

 

Shrug. I just used a bottle jack and a wooden block to keep the engine from tilting too far back. I assume that was the purpose of your A-frame?

 

Nice A frame. I did not support the engine when removing the drivetrain and had no issues with it even coming close to the firewall. Lots of little "tricks" to this job, the first time is definitely the toughest.

I think by far the easiest way to reassemble is:
Install clutch components
Install just the torque tube, support it from hanging too low at the rear with a strap or tall jack
Bolt the diff to the trans on the shop floor and then install to the torque tube as an assembly
Raise the Torque Tube/Trans/Diff assembly up into the body and suspend with a strap or jack
Install the cradle

 

i like the idea of the longer bolts, going to do that!

 

I agree with the assembly order. installing the torque tube without transaxle is much easier. It's much too hard to fit the complete assembly and maintain alignment with the clutch plate/ pilot bearing and splined shaft.
I tried it both ways...