[beeb]

Hi folks,

A few months back I purchased a '91 Sierra, with a 1.6L Vitara motor & Gearbox, HD clutch, twin lockers, 31's, lift, etc...

After owing it a couple of months, the clutch cable let go (split the outer sheath and all the reinforcing cables pushed out of the way and let the inner cable take a shortcut). This resulted in a loss of gear selection, and only got the car home with some very "bush-mechanic" repairs with a bit of fencing wire and some duct-tape.

I ordered a replacement of Low-Range Off-Road, forgetting it would be to suit a LHD vehicle, but it actually ended up routing better than the original RHD cable, but after the initial install and setup, I have been having ongoing dramas with the adjustment of the clutch cable - mainly that the release point rises to the very of the top of the pedal. At the moment it seems to be worse on the freeway. You can adjust it, drive it for 20mins on the freeway, and it's straight back at the top of the pedal.

Not much information to go off I know, but does anyone have any suggestions what may be the cause?

At first I tried adjustment through the little "clicker" just in front of the clutch fork, but it seems like it's stuffed and slipping, so tried adjustment of the nut behind the clutch-fork, but still have the same issue...

The only other thing I can think is where the two jam-nuts that are meant to mount onto a bracket in the original Sierra orientation are are not mounted directly to a bracket, just tightened up around a spacer that sits inside a clip on the side of the g/box housing, maybe I need to improve the mounting of that somehow?

So yeah - any help would be appreciated, as I basically can't drive the thing until I fix this issue!

[jono165]

beeb wrote:

HD clutch

I'd put money on the HD clutch being the problem, theyre usually pretty hard on clutch cables and the point on the firewall where it mounts.

[alien]

can you take pics of the adjustment area of the clutch cable for us?

[beeb]

jono165 wrote:

I'd put money on the HD clutch being the problem, theyre usually pretty hard on clutch cables and the point on the firewall where it mounts.

I appreciate it could be hard on the cable, but I couldn't see that making the adjustment go out while driving down the freeway?

alien wrote:

can you take pics of the adjustment area of the clutch cable for us?

Sure can!

If these aren't clear enough let me know and I'll get some more.

This is the bracket hanging ofthe side of the engine. The two nuts on the cable are bolted up around a spacer and washer (that's how the old one I took off was so I set it up the same), but I'm thinking maybe they should be done up directly onto the bracket somehow?




This is the clutch lever end: (It has a 14mm nut on the far side with a section that is curved to sit up against the pin inside the clutch lever)



And just a bit of a general overview of the setup: (Sorry it's a bit blurry...)

[royce]

rising to the top of the pedal suggests the cable is tightening itself, normally they move towards the firewall, which is the cable stretching.

that bracket is meant to be for a 95 on Vitara cable, which doesn't have nuts there it has a rubber bush which makes things worse.

But yeah HD clutches in Vitara boxes are crap, having a Sierra pedal might be even worse as I am sure they have less pedal travel, id be inclined to fit a sierra box back in

[beeb]

royce wrote:

rising to the top of the pedal suggests the cable is tightening itself, normally they move towards the firewall, which is the cable stretching.

That's a very good point. I'll probably pull that bracket off and modify it so it just has a hole through a flat plate to mount those nuts around.

royce wrote:

But yeah HD clutches in Vitara boxes are crap, having a Sierra pedal might be even worse as I am sure they have less pedal travel, id be inclined to fit a sierra box back in

Out of curiousity, what makes the HD clutch in a Vitara box no good? Is there a common failure point with them, or just driveability/maintenance issues?


At this stage I'm thinking to just get a threaded rod crimped onto the end of the cable, and just manually adjust it as needed. I just need to find someone that would do it... It seems like it would be a lot of work to convert it over to a Sierra g/box for something that's only an adjustment issue. When it's adjusted right, it's no problem - it's just it doesn't stay there.

[buzbox]

Too much reading, pictures too pretty, underside is not dirty enough..

But yeah, shouldn't have bought HD clutch.

Go 4WDing up some steep inclines, ride the clutch until it fry's and get a standard replacement.
Or find a replacement cable, which i happen to have one.

[alien]

Dunno if this is any help, but its from the Vitara FSM:

Attachment:

Vitara-Clutch.PNG

[losfer]

wrong cable / bracket setup . clutch release arm set at wrong position . no nut on bottom bell housing stud .

[royce]

beeb wrote:

Out of curiousity, what makes the HD clutch in a Vitara box no good? Is there a common failure point with them, or just driveability/maintenance issues?

With a standard clutch in a vitara there is barely enough travel in the pedal to keep the adjustment correct, slightest bit of cable stretch and its out and then you are holding a clutch at its heavy point which then makes it worse bla bla bla

In order to make HD clutches usable to the weak legged, they move the pivot point in the pressure plate, so it clamps more but needs the same effort to work, cept Fulcrum tells us we now hove more travel to deal with, travel that isn't available so you can never get a decent pedal unless you set the pedal rest point really high.

honestly id be happy to have it your way, Id make a bracket to hold the cable better, move the arm like losfer said and then mark the nuts to see if one is moving

[beeb]

royce wrote:

that bracket is meant to be for a 95 on Vitara cable, which doesn't have nuts there it has a rubber bush which makes things worse.

Yep, I'll tackle that bracket and modify it so it's closer to stock Sierra so I can clamp those nuts down on something solid.

royce wrote:

But yeah HD clutches in Vitara boxes are crap, having a Sierra pedal might be even worse as I am sure they have less pedal travel, id be inclined to fit a sierra box back in

How much work would be involved in the changeover? Is there adaptor kits and clutches readily available? Personally at this point I feel it can be made to work (because sometimes it works fine for quite long periods), but if this ends up being the long-term solution I'd be interested to know how much is involved in the swap, and how the box would hold up behind the 1.6.

alien wrote:

Dunno if this is any help, but its from the Vitara FSM:

Attachment:

Vitara-Clutch.PNG

Cheers, had already found the Sierra equivelant, but always handy to have another reference...

losfer wrote:

wrong cable / bracket setup . clutch release arm set at wrong position . no nut on bottom bell housing stud .

Cable/Bracket setup will be corrected ASAP, clutch release arm isn't on as much of an angle as it appears in the picture, but I'll see if it has any more room to be rearranged and give that a go. And I'll have to look at that stud, I had thought it was a bolt and wouldn't need a nut, but if it's a stud I'll definitely get onto it pronto! Cheers for the heads up.

royce wrote:

With a standard clutch in a vitara there is barely enough travel in the pedal to keep the adjustment correct, slightest bit of cable stretch and its out and then you are holding a clutch at its heavy point which then makes it worse bla bla bla

In order to make HD clutches usable to the weak legged, they move the pivot point in the pressure plate, so it clamps more but needs the same effort to work, cept Fulcrum tells us we now hove more travel to deal with, travel that isn't available so you can never get a decent pedal unless you set the pedal rest point really high.

honestly id be happy to have it your way, Id make a bracket to hold the cable better, move the arm like losfer said and then mark the nuts to see if one is moving

Sounds like a plan Royce, and cheers for the info. Making a bit more sense now. Frustrating because when it's in the right spot it's no problem!

[royce]

if it goes bad and comes good check the arm isnt cracked around the spline

[beeb]

Another very good suggestion. Cheers folks, I'm hoping to get a bit of time to play around with it tomorrow, but we'll see how we go. I'll let you know the results once I've started to change things.

[beeb]

Also (mainly out of curiousity) - Does anyone do hydraulic clutch conversion on these?

[Gwagensteve]

Not that I am aware of.

note that the 2.0 vitaras run a hydraulic clutch from the factory, but it's not going to be a swap over into a 1.6 gearboxed car.

As has been pointed out, it looks like the problem is mostly due to incorrect parts and fitting, but the HD clutch will be compounding the problem. A properly geared sierra doesn't need a HD clutch, especially as you have a vitara gearbox - these have a larger clutch than a 1.3 gearbox and won't give any trouble - unlike a HD clutch which will cause cable/fork/firewall/pivot problems.

Steve.

[beeb]

Well, I'm just going to put my hand up here and admit good old fashioned human-error on my part.

Not ever having owned a clutch-cabled vehicle before this one, and rather hurriedly making an adjustment on the way home from high-country on Australia day weekend I must've messed up and over-adjusted (overtightened) the adjustment nut, which in effect gave the clutch no free-play.

I adjusted it back a little yesterday, and now all seems to be fine again.

Cheers for the info about the Sierra/Vitara gearboxes and HD clutch issues, but when the clutch is adjusted correctly it seems to be a non-issue in this case. The old cable I removed didn't look to have any unusual wear, just a split where it'd come free of a clamp and ended up resting against something hot/moving. With the new cable, and a now corrected adjustment, everything seems to be running smoothly again.

Sorry for leading everyone in the wrong direction, guess sometimes it pays to double-check the basics...