lightened fly wheel?

[Nick W]

Well my Shorrock mini soon ate its original clutch . Whilst I have the flywheel off ,is it worth fitting a lightened one
Tick over...will it be adversely affected
Torque......will it loose some
What will be the benefits other than being lighter.
Or should I use standard one as my original idea was not to over tune it

Nick

[mk1]

Stick with the standard flywheel. Nothing to be gained in lightening it. You will make tickover a little rougher & gain nowt.

M

[Nick W]

That's good thanks Mark ,I'm putting a cooper S orange spring but standard plate in it
First time lve changed a mini clutch with the engine in, 2 of the cover bolts were difficult to access.
Is it even possible to get them back in!. Do you gain a bit more room with the exhaust removed and engine jacked up?

Nick

[mk1]

Hi Nick,

If you have managed to extract them, you have done very well. I am sure that some folks will be horrified, but I rarely re fit the two bolts in question. I have never had a problem from not having them in.

M

[CooperTune]

I would suggest you stick with a blue spring for a std set up. The orange spring is to much for a street driven car. It will put undue stress on the thrust the hydraulics and your leg. With proper preload the blue should do all you need. Also save your old thrust plate from your old spring the new ones are not correctly hardened and wear quickly. Steve (CTR)

[graham.codling]

Yes mark I'm horrified

[almondgreen]

I have done many miles without the two bolts

[360gts]

Agree...never put the extra bolts in....even in our race car.
However, we finally did a nice mod on the race car ...as a "just in case"...when we pulled the whole unit out after a season we changed the sub-frame (DRY) from a normal frame to an automatic frame. They are wider apart where the mounts go and the lower lip is also removed. We used two 7/16" spacers attached to the engine mounts to make up the difference.. Sure made life a whole easier when doing clutch changes in the pits.

[Lakeland997]

A lightened flywheel can also make the clutch more liable to overheat as there's not as much metal to absorb the heat (ask me how I know).

With regard to the clutch cover, I do jack up the engine at the back end and usually only have difficulty with one of the screws (the one at the back that's close to the subframe tower).
I get round this by slotting the offending hole in the cover so that next time you only need to loosen the screw and not remove it but you can only do this in one place.

[Daz1968]

I must have been lucky but on my 1962 deluxe I jacked engine slightly and had no major problem removing and fitting all bolts, only issue I had was re compressing the clutch as it was coil sprung and I hadn't got the right tool for it.

[graham.codling]

Leaving bolts out no excuse to do the job right

[ianh1968]

I get round this by slotting the offending hole in the cover
so that next time you only need to loosen the screw and not remove it
but you can only do this in one place.

Genius!


I've always managed to get both screws back in...

Firstly, I've relieved the cover and case to allow a combination spanner
to go on back-to-front. The spanner also needs to be whacked to change
the offset slightly. You can then do the bottom one up from under the
car.

ClutchCvrSpanner.jpg

Ian

[YMJ]

Well sorry fellas, I'm going to have to go against the general consensus and say I jolly well don't agree with you ref. lightened flywheel or not question.?

I say go with the lightened flywheel..... after all, what harm can it do?
Don't agree that the less metal/less cooling theory....at least not for a fast road car
Yu'll get a much better engine pick up and acceleration
I've never noticed a lumpy tickover, not even on a race motor with a 649 cam, as long as the fuel mixture and ignition timing are dead right (dyno testing is essential for this).
If you've put a supercharger on the thing, you're looking for greater performance.....a lighter flywheel will give you this also
BUTfor God's sake get it well balanced by someone who knows what they're doing, i.e go to someone by personal referral rather than just sending it someone who advertises in C&CC or Max Power magazine for example.
AND go through a tried and tested flywheel tightening regime. I know what mine is and I know it works but I'm sure someone else will think it's crap. Ask around

Remember..... if you improve 100 things by just 1%, you'll go 100% faster

NB. the author will take no responsibility for a job loss, loss of earnings, or a failed marriage in the event of a crank/engine/flywheel failure!

[Spider]

Well sorry fellas, I'm going to have to go against the general consensus and say I jolly well don't agree with you ref. lightened flywheel or not question.?

I say go with the lightened flywheel..... after all, what harm can it do?
Don't agree that the less metal/less cooling theory....at least not for a fast road car
Yu'll get a much better engine pick up and acceleration
I've never noticed a lumpy tickover, not even on a race motor with a 649 cam, as long as the fuel mixture and ignition timing are dead right (dyno testing is essential for this).
If you've put a supercharger on the thing, you're looking for greater performance.....a lighter flywheel will give you this also
BUTfor God's sake get it well balanced by someone who knows what they're doing, i.e go to someone by personal referral rather than just sending it someone who advertises in C&CC or Max Power magazine for example.
AND go through a tried and tested flywheel tightening regime. I know what mine is and I know it works but I'm sure someone else will think it's crap. Ask around

Remember..... if you improve 100 things by just 1%, you'll go 100% faster

NB. the author will take no responsibility for a job loss, loss of earnings, or a failed marriage in the event of a crank/engine/flywheel failure!

I agree completely.

It won't affect torque in any way, but will spin up and down faster.

The other thing that I haven't seen mentioned - yet - is that the crankshaft will last way longer.