hydraulic clutch problem?

[miker519]

Hi all and hello I am looking for some help.
I have recently purchased a Morris Traveller and she's great except for a problem with clutch. The pedal travel is down to the floor so I tried to adjust it and found that the pedal has no free play. If I take it back to set some free play the throw is not sufficient to disengage the clutch, In fact you have to set the push rod already putting pressure on the pressure plate to be able to change gear and the pedal is on the boards.
She has a t9 ford box so I am not sure what type of clutch is fitted, I have tried to contact the previous owner with no response so any help or ideas would be welcome.
Best regards Mick Roden

[oliver90owner]

I suspect you may have a coil spring clutch and the ford had a diaphragm clutch?

Apart from that, Phil will likely be along to offer better advice.

[miker519]

hi Oliver
thanks for getting back. that is the main problem I do not know what is inside the bellhousing.
can anyone point me in the right direction as to what would be the normal setup for this conversion ?
any pointers would be a help.
Thanking you in advance
Best regards Mick

[Sleeper]

Do you have a concentric clutch slave inside the bellhousing or a usual slave on the outside of the bellhousing?

Looks like you have a mismatch of Master to Slave

John

[philthehill]

The problem with the Minor/Ford T9 clutch operation is that it is a compromise. The only satisfactory solution is to fit a fully concentric hydraulic slave cylinder.
If using the Minor release arm the release arm has a tendency to hit the edge of the hole in the bell housing before releasing the clutch. To overcome you may have to elongate the hole in the bellhousing. Also you may have to bend/re-profile the release arm to suit.
Unfortunately once you move away from standard it usually means that you have to fettle the parts to get a good and satisfactory operation.
Photos of the current set up you have would be helpful.
Below is the clutch release mechanism as fitted to my Minor with a Ford box. The hole in the bellhousing for the release arm had to be elongated and the release arm had to be bent/reprofiled to suit. The release arm is hydraulically activated.

clutch release.jpg (881.29 KiB) Viewed 19810 times

[miker519]

Hello Phil
Thanks for the input, it's looking like I will have to pull the engine and gearbox out and find out what I've got. As you said once you move away from standard it becomes a bit of a minefield. It has got an external slave it just seams short on reach? is the concentric thrust bearing a big job? Bought the car at auction expecting to get some sort of history file with it but got nothing relevant and no responce after trying to contact the previous owner. Everything that I have looked at so far has got its own problems. Dream car turning in to a bit of a project not what I wanted but as they say buyer beware with luck I will get there in the end. I will try and get some pic's tomorrow if it stops raining, Just of to look up concentric thrust bearings.
Best regards Mick.

[philthehill]

As regards the concentric release bearing it depends what you want as they are not cheap. The release bearing on my Ford gearbox to 'A' Series engine is concentric but is operated by a non concentric release arm which goes off centre relative to the release bearing. The release arm is designed to operate as it does and it works well but it took about 10 gearbox in - out goes to get it right. Not only did I have to modify/adjust the release arm but I had to modify the rear of the Midget crankshaft to accommodate the roller type spigot bush. When the Ford gearbox was fitted way back it was early days of fitting Ford gearboxes to 'A' Series and a lot had to be done by 'suck it and see' especially when it came to the 1275cc 'A' Series engine. As far as I know my Ford gearbox was the first C S Autoclassics kit to be fitted to a 1275cc 'A' Series engine so 'suck it and see' required right from the start.
Before taking out the gearbox I would disconnect the slave cylinder and move the release arm and see how much free movement of the arm you have and how much bell housing opening clearance you have when the release arm is operates as if the clutch was going to be released. Please take a photo of the disconnected arm pressed rearwards and post on here for further advice.
Phil

[Sleeper]

Mick

You have PM.

John

[miker519]

Hi Phil
sorry for the delay in getting back as ever just when your trying to get something sorted life gets in the way. however hope to get some more info for you over the weekend and will post it back. In the pic it shows the bracket for mounting the release arm bolted to the bellhousing can that be moved forward with a packer? or is that a road not to go down?
Be in touch soon thanks again for your time and assistance
Best regards Mick

[miker519]

Hi John
Thanks for the pm I'm in darkest Handsacre in Staffordshire so a good two hours away in the moggy. So I will keep you posted and thanks for the input it all adds to the picture.
Best regards Mick

[miker519]

Hi Phil and all
finally got some time on the moggy over the bank holiday.
Phil to answer some of your questions Push rod in slave 125mm long with 85 mm thread, 8mm dia looks homemade, no ball on end just badly filled rad. The swivel nut is a poor fit in the release armand sticks a bit. the arm has about 20 mm clearance on the bellhousing.
The clutch pedal only gives about 20mm stroke on the master cylinder and only getting about 3 to 4 mm at the slave.
Looking through the spare hole on the bellhousing I now know that it has a ford type pressure plate and a roller bearing type thrust bearing mounted on a carrier. The carrier seems to jam at times. The release arm looks stanard minor.
stripped all the hydraulics down checked the seals and the movement made no difference. not loosing any fluid. Had to buy some Dot5 to bleed the system that was a bit of a shock £49.79p for a ltr ! bleed the system till its clear go back after ten minuets air back in the system.
I have taken some photos but cannot find out how to post them read through the six pages on how to post a picture just got more confused? will try again so any advice would be welcome. I hope that the info shines some light on the problems. All comments and advice welcome.
Best regards and thanks in advance
Mick

[philthehill]

Thanks for the update. It appears that you have a very similar clutch release set up to mine.
I look forward to seeing the photos before making any further comment.
Phil

[miker519]

Hi Phil and all
Still struggling with posting photo's Will have another go in the morning
Best regards Mick

[miker519]

Still having probs cannot drag/drop, cut and paste, insert or import
read the How to insert a photo thread again. Not any help any ideas tec is not my best subject?
Any help would be appreciated.
Best regards Mick

[miker519]

not a clue how that happened

[miker519]

will work through what I tried one thing at a time?
well I have got something but its not pretty

[miker519]

hi again approx. how much movement should I need to operate the clutch? the pressure plate fingers look shot? would it work better with the Morris pressure plate as it looks deeper ?
regards Mick

[philthehill]

Thanks for posting the photos.
I cannot clearly see how the release bearing is mounted/operated inside the bell housing.
The operating rod is normal for the conversion.
The release arm appears to have little travel to release the clutch and looks as if it requires bending to give the right leverage. It should be noted that I had to bend the release arm on my set up to get the clutch to release.

[Sleeper]

The gap between the pressure plate fingers and the release bearing looks a little like the Grand Canyon , If it was me , it would be engine out time ?

John

[miker519]

hello Phil, John and all
A little background information.
The problem that I had was that the clutch pedal was on the floor to get a clean gear change and had very /no feel to it. When I went to adjust it the slave cylinder push rod was holding the release bearing hard against the pressure plate. After trying to release some of the pressure it proved that the position that it was in was the first point that gave a clean gear change although it was right at the bottom of the pedal travel.
Phil asked if I could put some pic's on the thread. So I stripped slave cylinder off and found that the release arm was locked in position so I removed the rubber release arm cover to try and see what was going on. but the arm was in the way but could see another hole in the other side of the bellhousing which is where most of the photo's were taken from.
the release bearing was still hard against the fingers on the pressure plate and i could not move the release arm by hand so I gave it a little tap with a hide mallet nothing moved so hit it a bit harder and the arm moved but the bearing and carrier had not. The bearing carrier was still in position so I popped the arm back on. At this point I foolishly thought that I had found the problem and after ten minuets prodding and poking with a long heavy screwdriver managed to free the carrier/bearing from the pressure plate to reveal the damage to the fingers and got the bearing and arm operating again though not very smoothly.
So cleaned everything and reassembled it adjusted so that the return spring held the bearing just clear of the pressure plate by about one turn of the adjuster. tried the clutch not a chance had to adjust the clutch back to where we started to get a clean gear change and the pedal was back to the bottom of it's travel. The view with the big gap was when it was all freed off with no slave cylinder before reassembly.
I have checked the slave and master cylinders bleed the system and get about 7mm of movement at the slave would this normally be adequate?
hope this helps any thoughts or comments welcome think it might be engine out time?
Best regards Mick