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MG Midget and Sprite Technical - Concentric clutch - pedal travel

For those chaps with a concentric clutch - what is your pedal travel like? i.e. between slipping and bite point?

Mine seems half decent. starts to grip about halfway up, then bites after a good inch of pedal travel.

Had an interesting evening trying to bleed it, found out I hadn't tightened it up before putting it in! good job there is extra holes in the bellhousing to get fingers in. Andy did the honours with his lady hands....

But it's now bled and the pedal feels lovely and firm. Can't wait to see what it's like on the road.

Matt
Tarquin

Tarquin, mine is very progressive, moderately heavy - i.e. heavier to press than a standard slave but has a nice feel to it with a clear bite point. If any, my criticism would be that I don't think it is quite diengaging fully - although this is very slight. I suspect that the slave should have had another couple of mm in the thickness of the mounting block that I turned, to move it forwards just a tad.

Guy
Guy Weller

mine is considerably...

oops

mine is less like a clutch, more like an on off button

from "foot off" to clutch disengaged the pedal movement is no more than an inch

unfortunately the pedal effort is very high and in traffic can be relied on to bloody well hurt after a while

I put this down (in concert with many wise heads around here) to me still using the original half house brick sized dollop of cast steel master cylinder and it not liking propelling fluid through my slave cylinder.

One did get used to it quickly, but Gwyn didnt like it at all and now refuses to drive the car

I have considered putting a dollop of wood on the floor to prevent enthusiastic (other) users from over throwing the clutch diaphragm, It only needs that inch to do all the work, any more will be overkill

But next major mod when the newer gearbox goes in is to fit the 1275 type pedal box assembly with two masters
bill sdgpm

Mine is a lot less progressive than the standard clutch with a bite point higher up than the standard pedal to the extent I had to make a shortened master cylinder rod to prevent over stroking the clutch. I have no problems using it though may experiment with different master sizes at a later date.
Daniel Thirteen-Twelve

I've driven Bill's and it is On/Off.
Gary Lazarus

Bill, is there any room on the top of the pedal to drill another hole shorter to the pivot point? This would give you a longer pedal.

Guy, yours is a mondeo one isn't it? Mine is one, and along with a standard 1275 M/C is the same setup as yours. Although I am using 3/16 tubing. My thoughts are that would only affect the heaviness of the pedal, not the actual mechanics of bite/release.
Tarquin

Matt

I dont think so

I am fully ready to swap pedal boxes anyway

I have 3/16 dia pipe too, not sure it made any difference

when you have used it a few times it bcomes natural, but I am considering making the pedal travel limited, rather for Daniel's reasons

so much to do...so little inclination to fall to my elderly knees and deal with it
bill sdgpm

Mine is the later style M/C - not Bill's the brick version!
My slave is a Ford one - boxed as a Fiesta/ Puma but I think is the same as the Mondeo.

When I did mine I did try and find out what the slave ratio would be. i.e. how much fluid pumped into the doughnut shaped slave chamber would produce a known forwards movement of the release bearing. We know that the required movement is around 8mm but how much fluid is needed to produce that? It should be easy to find this design detail, but I couldn't locate it anywhere. As this is a parameter of the slave design, there is nothing certain that eg the SAAB one has the same ratio as the Ford one. This in itself could explain Bill's on /off switch design. After all the M/C cylinders were designed to move similar - if not identical volumes of fluid to activate the standard slave cylinders.

(I believe there are 2 diameters of slaves used over the years - do these correspond to the brick and the later M/c types?)

Guy
Guy Weller

This thread was discussed between 26/05/2010 and 27/05/2010

MG Midget and Sprite Technical index

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