Best Clutch for 700+ HP

The stock crappy clutch just will not do anymore... I need to know what is the best clutch for daily driven high performance. I have approx 430 horsepower right now... but have plans for a lot more performance...so, with that being said, what should I get? Should I get the high grade clutch that I am going to need in the future? Part numbers and manufacturets please, specs are a plus too. Thanks

I'd suggest a McLeod Street Twin. Expensive, but daily-driveable and can handle tons of power.

If you can afford it, the best clutch for running over 700 RWHP will be the Street Twin.

If you can't afford it, a SPEC stage IV will hold up just fine as well.

I currently am putting just about 600 to the wheels and my SPEC stage 3 is holding up just fine, and it feels lighter and easier to engage than my factory clutch in my Formula!

omg 1200 dollar clutch! I found it on summit, but it holds up to 1200 ft/lbs of torque! wow... what brand of stage 4?

Uh, what brand? SPEC.

omg 1200 dollar clutch! I found it on summit, but it holds up to 1200 ft/lbs of torque! wow... what brand of stage 4?

Look around at the advertisers here. Quite often you can find the street twin much cheaper here.

Lol... I had seed some clutches on ebay that said "spec" in their names... and I thought that it meant spec like in engine specs or something lol... anyways, I dida google search and found out right after I made that post.... :( sorry guys, I'm a douche bag.:(

anyone else?

I have the Spec IV in my car, w/ 355hp at the wheels. I plan on adding another 200 with nitrous. Its not as bad on the street as lots of people said it was going to be. I'm perfectly fine with it.

get the twin, its about 1000 bucks, but comes with a billet flywheel and adjustable master cylinder, so its not too bad of a deal, and damn its tough. I daily drive a 520 rwhp trans am 250 miles a week in stop and go traffic, feels like my old wrangler

I would also recommend the Mcleod Street Twin. The kit is well worth the $1035.00 price tag.

The Street Twin is by far the best clutch out there for a hi-po LT1.

Rich

Another vote for the Street Twin. Looks like VRE has a good deal on it too.

I have heard that once your street twin does eventaully wear out on you, you can have it re-built time and time again for fairly cheep.

Well, my street twin just blew up yesterday… after not quite 6K miles, and almost no abuse (before that I got 28K miles out of a stocker + a lot of dragstrip passes and spray)

If the street twin had a vagina, I would not only attempt to procreate with it, but I would ask for it's pressure plate in marriage.

Well, my street twin just blew up yesterday… after not quite 6K miles, and almost no abuse (before that I got 28K miles out of a stocker + a lot of dragstrip passes and spray)

Have you performed an autopsy to try to see what COD was?

If the street twin had a vagina, I would not only attempt to procreate with it, but I would ask for it's pressure plate in marriage.


LOL :)

If your staying with the standard LT1 pull style PP and LT1 bellhousing, The Street Twin wins hands down. If you're launching hard at the track, you would be well advised to move to a blow proof bell housing and step to a 11" clutch disk and long finger style PP. That's not a cheap conversion but it can be done (see sig). I tend to value my tootsies so I made the move even though my power level is a bit more wimpy. In any case, if you're bracket racing weekly and dumping at 5500 rpm you'll kill the disk in one season no matter what combination you use.

Steve

I ordered a mcleod today... now I am brok again :(

Have you performed an autopsy to try to see what COD was?

Not yet. I was pretty much disgusted with it by the time I got it home, it still “worked” enough that I was able to pull it behind the tow truck to get it loaded, but it wouldn’t disengage to unload it, so I just tied a tow strap to it and pulled it into a parking space in front of the house with the truck and left it there. I’ll mess with the 4L80e that I’m building for my 3rd gen or tinker with the truck for a while, don’t really want to know.

I did, some time during the 7 r & r’s that I did originally installing it (McLeod sent me 2 bad TOB’s, a messed up PP, a messed up floater and imbalanced parts… it got really old), cut the part of the dust shield so it can be removed without touching the starter or anything else, and judging from the shrapnel and the way it’s acting I’m guessing that one of the clutch hubs or the floater came apart, but I’m pretty sure something is jambed in the PP fingers judging from the noise it’s making.

Wow... I can already see/ feel the difference and the clamping power over the stock clutch. It is gonna take some time to get used to though... hard for me to feather the clutch so far...practice makes perfect...

**My left calf is gonna be huge**

As the ST breaks in it will be a lot less grabby. The pedal effort is pretty light considering the amount of power the clutch can handle.

McLeod sent me 2 bad TOB’s, a messed up PP, a messed up floater and imbalanced parts… it got really old making.

I got a dud street twin 2 months ago and I encountered the same issues. The rotating assembly was 16 grams out of balance out of the box. After 3 trany drops, the latest TODAY, I'm sending it back. Fortunately they are standing behind their product. Just curious did you order the zero balanced flywheel? I did. FYI...Mcleod was recently bought out by...ARP (i think). I hope its not a sign of thinks to come.

I'm going back to my stock flywheel and a Spec IV for now. The Spec III held up fine for 20K before the blower. But 4,400lbs and 516rwtq, a twin disk would be preferred.

B&M bpught out McLeod. I am guessing that without having the guy there whose name is on the product it will just become another "profit center". Too bad, the really great aftermarket companies are the ones where the founder is in charge and takes personal pride in the product. It's great when you can call up and talk to "the man". McLeod used to be like that. I talked to McLeod (himself) a couple of times and got great information and service.

Rich

hmm, so am I hearing that the street twin is no longer the way to go?? if not, what is next in line?

It's still the best choice for a hi-po LT1.

Rich

I would not have purchased the Street Twin in the first place if I didn't think it was the best solution out there. I will eventually try it again and hope for better results. I just really miss driving my car and I know my old setup works.

hmm, by hi powered, what kind of numbers are we talkin about here? Mine put down 422 rwhp and 420rwtq, but that soon should be bumped up a bit after I put on the twin 58TB and finally finish dyno tuning it... plus Im gettin the dana 60 rear this winter, my poor stocker is going to hell fast, along with the stock 6-speed. The only good synchro is 6th, as it doesn't get used much! :D

Taner is closing in on 8's and launches at ~5000RPM. AFAIK, he's still running a ST.

the street twin is the only choice in my book. and Rich, Red is still around! their customer service is second to none and they support the customers in a big way!

good choice on clutch!

the street twin is the only choice in my book. and Rich, Red is still around! their customer service is second to none and they support the customers in a big way!

good choice on clutch!

Well this is definately a plus to hear! Im just worried about the new ones as I see people with problems purchased theirs recently... :(

Well this is definately a plus to hear! Im just worried about the new ones as I see people with problems purchased theirs recently... :(

i didn't know there were problems? then again it is not like i have time to search for things like that, I have sold a couple of twins from our shop and both are working flawlessly!

Well, I dont know if anyone is still looking into this thread, but the clutch is well broken in now and I am used to it... clamps great, very streetable, all around great investment...

It clamped sooo good that I blew out my stock 10 bolt (I knew the day was coming)... at least it was against another camaro (68 z28 w/ a 454 BB and stickeys) lol

How's the drivability?

phenomenal driveability. My car is a daily driver, and it is fine for daily use...
the clutch pedal (adjustable) is a little stiffer than regular. Easy to get used to though.

The street twin I drove had about a 1/4 of an inch between the clutch disengage, and engage. It was a royal PITA to drive around town in. On the plus side though, when you wanted to race, it was like an on/off switch.

If installed correctly, they drive fine after a few hundred miles. The engagement range is short though, so it takes a little finese to drive.

I guess you aren't a finese kind of guy? ;)

Rich

Yeah, having just driven in a street twin clutch car once, vs my SPEC stage III (which drives nicely on the street) that I am used to, I didn't really care for it.

I'm sure if I had gotten to drive it more often, I would have required more "finese" :)

If you ever make more power than the spec iii can handle, specs iv and v are there and I hear the spec v is a biotch to handle on the street... plenty of options, but true, the mcleod did take some getting used to

My power level probably would call for a SPEC stage IV or greater. However since I only track the car less than a half dozen times a year, and will probably have slicks on it at the track 3 of those 6 times, and all the rest I wll be spinning with DR's, I think my stage III should hold up.

OMG. i almost spit out my coffee when I read this.

If the street twin had a vagina, I would not only attempt to procreate with it, but I would ask for it's pressure plate in marriage.

OMG. i almost spit out my coffee when I read this.

lmao! I laughed sooo hard when i first read it too. LOL!

Have you performed an autopsy to try to see what COD was?

Somehow I noticed this again…, and it’s been a while and I have to car on the road again.

COD: the splines on one of the clutch disks tore out. Not the hub center like I’ve seen before or other related stuff, the actual splines tore out on _one_ of the clutch disks and not the other.
http://mpikas.midimonkey.com/images/Automotive/97WS6/Clutch2/ST_06-12-20_01s.jpg

I’ve never that kind of failure. All the noise metal trash was the splines munching on the splines on the input shaft and everything slipping/grinding causing massive heat, and then I suppose when it finally would grab that was the whole assembly, both disks, floater, pressure plate… all getting together and finally grabbing the “good” remaining disk (I say “good” because that one had signs of the splines wollowing out also, but they were still complete and hadn’t damaged that part of the input shaft yet).
http://mpikas.midimonkey.com/images/Automotive/97WS6/Clutch2/ST_06-12-20_02s.jpg (it’s hard to see)

I’m not sure what the binding once it was engaged was, unless it was the roughed up splines not allowing the disks to slide enough on the shaft to disengage completely.

FWIW, it was very obviously a metalergy problem with the hub on the shaft, since even with damage to that extent, it barely messed up the input shaft, and only the hub that totally tore out did, the splines where the other engaged were still fine:
http://mpikas.midimonkey.com/images/Automotive/97WS6/Clutch2/ST_06-12-20_09s.jpg
(you could see shiny spots where the front disk engaged on the splines, but they are not actually worn, at least not a measurable amount).

Oh, and to add insult to injury, this is one of the older setups where you would rebuild the slave with a smaller sleeve/piston to get more travel to work the larger stack of moving parts… McLeod eventually did something different because almost everyone apparently ended up with leaking seals when they rebuilt it. Well, my seals were fine but I found that the McLeod sleeve rusted out and was leaking into the bottom of the housing (must have just happened because I didn’t notice it in the reservoir yet, but when I went to mess with it the boot around the end of the slave was FULL of fluid).

So far Mcleod has been cool about it since the rest of the story is I got _fed up_ with breaking **** on this car about the time that I put this clutch in and went from making a couple of hundred passes a year to almost none (I think I do have 1 or 2 passes on it), and finally parked the car for 4 years and didn’t drive it at all). The end result is that this thing hasn’t been beat on at all and has almost no miles on it. It took a while to find someone at McLeod that had a clue what I was talking about, but when I did he agreed that there is no way in hell that it should have failed that way and to send it back and he’ll rebuild it, replace/upgrade all the bad parts and send me back a complete “new” assembly. They’ve had the clutch for a week so far and I haven’t gotten any calls or emails back, so I don’t know what’s going on at this point, but I’m not overly surprised since it took over 2 months of this before I got anywhere with it before.

Hopefully I’ll know soon. In the mean time I fixed everything and slapped a center force DF clutch in it.

BTW, for those of you bitching about driveability… I agree 100% about the aluminum flywheel street twin. Between the light weight flywheel and unsprung hubs it’s not even a question of finesse, driving it on the street, it just has a harsh engagement doesn’t play nice. _Everyone_ when they got in my car the first time stalled it right off, there is no real gentle, stock type rolling off with light throttle with it.

The heavier steel flywheel covers most of this up and is MUCH more streetable.

FWIW, I mentioned it to a couple of people at McLeod, and I got the response “yea, I don’t know why we call the aluminum flywheel version the “street” twin.

Yes, the steel flywheel is the way to go except for racing. Depending on your combo, the steel may also be better for drag use. Road race type use or very fast open road driving will certainly benefit from the lighter aluminum flywheel though.

Rich

i have the steel one cuz it is better for drag racing. Nice and streetable to me. I love the fact that the mcleod is rebuildable too.

... It took a while to find someone at McLeod that had a clue what I was talking about, but when I did he agreed that there is no way in hell that it should have failed that way and to send it back and he’ll rebuild it, replace/upgrade all the bad parts and send me back a complete “new” assembly. They’ve had the clutch for a week so far and I haven’t gotten any calls or emails back, so I don’t know what’s going on at this point, but I’m not overly surprised since it took over 2 months of this before I got anywhere with it before.

Hey man just looking for an update on this as I'm looking for a good clutch and want to know what kind of customer service McLeod provided you. Thanks

Well, they never actually called me back when I called them, took literally months (I think a little over 3 months from when I got started) before I got a phone call out of the blue from what I would best describe as a receptionist/shipping type person who informed me that they will ship back my clutch when I pay for the rebuild (something just short of $500 I think it was), I called her extension, and after 5 tries and no call backs finally got a hold of her, explained the situation, she told me that she’d call me back later that day. Never called me back, called a few more times trying to find out what happened to it, clutch appeared on my door step, 2 weeks later, incomplete. I never did get my shipping cost refunded (check to see what 40lbs via fed ex ground costs, that was the method they told me to ship it).

I won’t get into what damage this thing ended up doing to the inside of my transmission…

Oh, and this was all during their advertizing campagn where they were trying to convince us that they’re the same great company but now that they’re owned by B&M they’ll have better customer service (I think that they had a blurb about it in every one of the mags, HR/PHR/CC