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OEM clutch gone already???


rocknroll

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wow. my 94 jetta went 269,900 miles before i sold it with it's stock clutch still going strong. not bad for a daily driver that saw a lot of autocrosses and some track days.

 

my audi a4 went 120k miles on the stock clutch with over 240hp. that car only has 150hp stock.

 

the s4 i drove as a company car went over 120k on it's stock clutch too. it had 320 hp. the clutch was upgraded when bigger turbos were installed. it now has almost 180k and the new clutch, a stock rs4 clutch, is still holding fine. this is a car that does the occasional 4 wheel burnout too.

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The LGT clutch has a semi small surface area from the looks of it, much smaller then most performance cars in comparison. I bought my LGT with 35k on the clock and the clutch was toast 2,000 miles later, but I don't always drive my car gently either.

 

This is how bad my stock clutch was...

 

http://home.comcast.net/~burnu2/DSCF0412.JPG

 

http://home.comcast.net/~burnu2/DSCF0414.JPG

 

 

 

Pretty tore up, very little surface left. You could actually put the car in 1st at idle with the e-brake on and it will spin.

 

Clutch diameter is tiny, especially for a AWD car, but at the same time I guess that also has it's benefits. Clutch = under 500 and replaceable, tranny/axles/drivetrain = extremely expensive. Let the clutch spin if it saves my tranny's life.

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Here's the setup some of us have:

 

http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php?t=35865

 

Scroll down to the more recent posts for the latest info. RPS is a little slow on building the clutches.

 

My review of this setup is back up to #36 in this thread:

 

http://legacygt.com/forums/showpost.php?p=832306&postcount=36

Ron
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If you have 4th gear slip on a stock car at 12k, I'd be all over the dealer and SOA for warranty.

 

I've owned manuals all my life and the stock Legacy clutch is the worst I've ever experienced. It just sucks.

 

+1 for the RPS clutch/ACT flywheel combo from MTS. We've got several thousand miles on ours now and really like it. The effort is higher, but it's worth it.

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If you have 4th gear slip on a stock car at 12k, I'd be all over the dealer and SOA for warranty.

 

I've owned manuals all my life and the stock Legacy clutch is the worst I've ever experienced. It just sucks.

 

+1 for the RPS clutch/ACT flywheel combo from MTS. We've got several thousand miles on ours now and really like it. The effort is higher, but it's worth it.

 

 

It is odd, intermittent slippage and usually noticed in the mornings rather than any other time of the day; basically stock car. I am not sure exactly what is going on. I may go to the dealer, but if the problem is going to manifest itself again in just a few thousand miles, I might as well upgrade anyway.

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Colder in the morning = more power = more slippage, first thing that happened to me to... Higher gear = more load on the clutch. I started slipping in 5th then it rapidly went downhill from there.

 

RPS broke in a little bit, I like it a lot more now. When you first get it, engagement is an inch off the floor and you have two modes, grab and not grab so it's a little bit of a pain to get used to it. I've grown on it though.

 

The RPS definately has some push to it, my foot has cramps from it lol. I drove an automatic for the past 3 months and getting into that thing, my foot hasn't been the same... I should be jumping like mario in no time. :lol:

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Hehe. OK, I'm probably more grandpa and granola in my driving chars than many here, but I wouldn't underestimate the rigors of rural and mountain driving here in SW Montana. We get out, everywhere, all the time. This little OBXT will get into situations the designers never really imagined. A durable clutch seems like a no brainer for these cars. Time will tell in our case.

 

Remember that the Forum folks aren't a bunch of grandpas who only use the car to drive to church and the market. Collectively we drive the cars far harder than the average owner, as well as doing track and drag events. Look at the cars that most folks have, and you will see Stage 1 & 2 mods.

 

It didn't especially bother me that I only got 40K out of my stock clutch. I didn't buy the car for the same reasons that granola-crunchers buy Subarus.

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got a clutch question for you all.. hopefully it fits in with this discussion.

 

Don't drive my car very hard. (05 LegacyGT 14k miles) but today I decided to play so I gave the car some gas and let off the clutch pretty quickly. (however not dropped) car's rpms went UP.. car didn't move.. so I let off the gas and RPMs went down, tried to take off normally and it did just fine.. but felt a bit gittery.. Then the car stunk like clutch for a few hours after that.. Did I just screw up taking off or did I do something real bad?... car seemed to stay gittery for a while too..

 

is this a bad clutch?

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In my experience this car is difficult to launch, and if you don't do it just right you'll end up just spinning the clutch and going nowhere. The clutch probably felt strange for a while until the disc and pressure plate cooled down. These cars are also notorious for that clutch smell during spirited takeoffs. I wouldn't say it's a bad clutch, it's pretty much normal behavior for the stock unit.
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got a clutch question for you all.. hopefully it fits in with this discussion.

 

Don't drive my car very hard. (05 LegacyGT 14k miles) but today I decided to play so I gave the car some gas and let off the clutch pretty quickly. (however not dropped) car's rpms went UP.. car didn't move.. so I let off the gas and RPMs went down, tried to take off normally and it did just fine.. but felt a bit gittery.. Then the car stunk like clutch for a few hours after that.. Did I just screw up taking off or did I do something real bad?... car seemed to stay gittery for a while too..

 

is this a bad clutch?

 

Don't be too "confident" that your clutch is OK. Yes you'll hear alot and read alot about "clutch stink" take it from me and others that have a fried clutch in a relatively short period of time, the stock clutch is weak for the most part. I NEVER launched my car, never had a reason to, and my clutch is on the way out. I got the "stink" from my clutch a few times the first few months of ownership, before modifying it. I prob. should have had it checked out right then. Really I guess it doesn't matter b/c I think I'm going with an ACT or Spec clutch/flywheel regardless of my stocker being warrantied or not.

Stage2.5376, TDC ProTune,blah blah blahhhh and....Alky/H20 injection :icon_mrgr
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  • 4 weeks later...
I have been having issues with 1st gear slipping. Its wierd. When I am at a dead stop and I pull out of 1st gear, it kind of shakes a bit until 3-4K RPMS. Second through fifth gear is fine. First gear really sucks though. I will be the first to admit I have launched it a couple of times, but not a lot. Should I just take it to the dealer and have them test it out?
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I have been having issues with 1st gear slipping. Its wierd. When I am at a dead stop and I pull out of 1st gear, it kind of shakes a bit until 3-4K RPMS. Second through fifth gear is fine. First gear really sucks though. I will be the first to admit I have launched it a couple of times, but not a lot. Should I just take it to the dealer and have them test it out?

 

That is clutch chatter or clutch shudder. You've burnt/glazed your clutch some time recently. It will go away with some driving.

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That is clutch chatter or clutch shudder. You've burnt/glazed your clutch some time recently. It will go away with some driving.

 

Well its been doing this for a couple of weeks now. It doesn't do it when I am in a roll. Like when I am in traffic, it won't do it unless i come to a complete stop. Its aggrevating though.

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Couldn't hurt to take it in and see what they say. I didn't think they'd replace my clutch under warranty but they did. I'd have to agree though, sounds like it's a bad case of chatter. You've probably burned some clutch material into the surface of the flywheel or pressure plate. It will probably take a while to get rid of it, and it may never completely go away until the clutch assembly is replaced. It's probably nothing you did wrong, these clutches suck badly so it doesn't take much to screw them up.
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When my grandfather gave me his beloved '86 Volvo 240dl, it had over 400,000 miles on the odometer (travelling salesman). He babied that car and swore up and down that it was still on THE ORIGINAL CLUTCH, obviously I refused to believe him. 2-3 weeks after I started driving it (my first manual), I had to have it replaced... maybe he was telling the truth? :icon_conf

 

He probably wasn't lying - my brother picked up our grandfather's 240DL wagon which he used for deliveries for his music store. He had 200,000 miles on the original clutch.

 

Granted, it sure as hell didn't have the horsepower the LGT has, but I'd be disappointed to replace the clutch at 50K...I'm at 31K right now... :(

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  • 1 year later...

This makes very interesting reading. My '06 WRX used to get the clutch stink pretty bad if I fluffed a hill start or gave the car some serious beans in 2nd or 3rd and I've noticed similar stinky behaviour from my '05 LGT.

 

I would concur that the stock clutch is pretty crappy, it just certainly feels like the weak point on the car. I may pre-emptively change it but do you know what impact that would have on my extended warranty (the Subaru Gold plan) that I negotiated in with the purchase of my LGT.

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I replaced my stock clutch with an aftermarket unit, and about a year later the clutch fork failed (a known problem to Subaru, even with the stock clutch). They wouldn't even consider a warranty repair because of the aftermarket clutch.
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My stock clutch started slipping badly today on a trip to Tahoe and stinking. I only bought the damn car two weeks ago from a Subaru dealer too so I'm heading back there next week seeking a solution. The car has 44k on it so I'm not too happy that the clutch is giving up now.

 

I've had many manual transmission cars with far higher miles and HP ratings that have not eaten their clutches so quickly and no matter how much I dislike the standard clutch, I can't really justify buying an aftermarket one.

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I'm sure that anyone who owned a GT 5MT wagon did not use it only on Sundays for trips to church. FWIW, I've also had clutches that have lasted much longer, but mine died right at 40K. This was after 100+ dragstrip runs, plus a half-dozen track days, and daily runs to redline, so I wasn't displeased.

 

Since you don't know the PO nor how it was driven, it may have been surprising that it lasted as long as it did.

Ron
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