Clutch burned out; too cheap to buy a haynes manual.

Hey gang, Clutch has a funk and doesn't take off until at least 3500 rpm in my my first gen legacy. I bought the appropriate clutch kit and wheeling into carport tomorrow. Any suggestions/pointers on putting this thing in? I am a mechanic and have the appropriate equipment trans jack tools etc. But to be honest I haven looked underneath to even see what i have to do to stuff that clutch in there! I looked for a friendly walkthrough but couldn't find one, maybe I am a dummy, probably a dummy!

Its pretty simple on these cars.

 

Although I've always found pulling the motor to be easier then dropping the transmission. Its just easier to work on and your not on your back as much. But if you want to drop the transmission heres some simple steps.

 

First things first, drop the whole exhaust in one piece. Undo the 6 nuts that hold the manifold to the heads, the one bolt by the cat and undo all of the rubber exhaust hangers.

 

Remove the front axles, I just like to un do the struts and pull the hubs out. You'll want to undo the axle nut and the two 19mm bolts that hold the strut to the hub first. Now work your way toward the transmission, there should be a pin in the axle that you'll have to tap out with a small punch. Its tapered, if it doesn't come out easily when you start turn it around and go from the other side. From that point you'll be able to pull both front axles out.

 

Next your going to want to move to the rear of the car, begin removing all of the exhaust heat shields. You'll expose the driveshaft. Theres 4 small 12mm bolts and nuts that hold it to the rear diff. Remove these along with the bolts that hold the carrier bearing to the car. From here you'll be able to pull the driveshaft right out of the back of the tranny. WATCH out for fluid though, it will start to gush out the rear.

 

I'd move to the top now. Begin to unbolt the tranny from the motor. Theres a few bolts all the way around, including the 2 starter bolts. You'll need to remove these as well. Once you have these all un done I would head back under the car. Support the transmission with something and start to undo the tranny's crossmember.

 

You should now what to do from hear, although you may need a screwdriver and a putty knife to spilt the cases, sometimes they just don't want to come apart.

Thanks for the pointers man! I shall be wheeling the car into the garage momentarily. Once I get her jacked up I will decide whether or not pulling the motor will be the easier way to go!

I would go for the gearbox action to avoid all the fluid mess and connectors on the engine except for the gearbox oil leak.

 

Just change gearbox oil while you are at it.

The only fluid you would need to train would be that of the radiator, but theres a fitting on the passenger side of the radiator that you can connect a piece of 1/2 hose to, turn a valve and drain it into a gallon bucket.

 

You can take a look from here to decide whether or not you would like to replace it our reuse the old stuff.

 

To be honest, its much easier to line the motor up from the top then it is to line the transmission from the bottom. Just think of trying to hold the transmission up while you try and line the splines up in the flywheel.

 

 

Helpful hint: If you do just drop the transmission, I would highly recommend loosening the motor mounts and jacking the front of the motor up to help line everything up.

 

Keep the transmission crossmember and hardware near by, because once the trannys in you don't want it coming back out again.

Thanks for all of the help and suggestions guys. I wound up pulling the motor and am glad I did. When it came time to put everything back together I used a bottle jack to lift the tranny and make it easier to line everything up. The new clutch works great and the thing will probably last another 200,000 some odd miles. Also while I had the motor out I was able to find the pesky oil leak that was allowing the scoob to mark it's territory when it was parked overnight. It was some kind of circular cam seal thing. When I pulled it off, there was a seal similar to an o-ring. I decided that a bead of high temp silicone around the outer edge of the part would stop the leak. After a few cans of brake clean and some dirty rags later the area of the leak was clean and I was satisfied with my work. I moved the cherry picker in place and stuffed the ej22 engine back into it's home. A fresh dose of coolant and a little battle to defeat an air bubble in the cooling system and the car is up and running again! Once again thanks for all the suggestions and I will definitely turn here first when I am looking for help in the future!

Great!!!

 

Glad to hear that we could have been of some help. These cars are SOOOO easy to work on.