Burn Clutch.....

[YellowJacket]

Originally Posted by z12358

How many miles on your 987? If it's burnt and with little miles, you need to also figure out what you are doing to it that makes it burn prematurely -- or else the new one is going to burn fast too.

Z.

z12358 is correct -- there's no way you should be experiencing any signs of clutch wear on your car, considering how new it is. I've heard people say that Boxster clutches only last 50k miles. That should be your absolute minimum target -- most cars will go well over 100k on a clutch.

You should pay attention to your driving style. Don't dump the clutch, don't "power-shift", don't leave your foot resting on the clutch pedal while driving, don't leave your hand resting on the shifter, make sure you depress the clutch all the way, there are a million other little tips to help clutch life.

If you're sure you're not doing the above and it's STILL wearing prematurely, I would bring it to the attention to the dealer as a potential manufacturer's defect w/ your particular clutch.

[super66]

hey guys, it has like 12K miles but I know when it happened and well lets just say I was the idiot....it was couple times trying to gun the car and it didn't work....I posted the story the day it happened here.....embarassing....essentially I reved the car some where between 4 and 5 K and came of the clutch but not really fast.....and then nothing happened......the car lurched forward about but kind of just sat there making noise like I was caught in slo motion.....

then the stink showed up.......the good news is that I just got a call and they are fixing all the other minors....windstop ie......and he said my clutch looks good.....so I'm not sure why it started smelling again last night.....the smell was completely gone and only came back when I had my snow tires put on a cuople days back.....maybe those were stinking?? at a loss.....I'll have to keep an eye on it and promise the porsche goods to take some DE classes

[Paul]

You didn't leave the parking brake on, right?

[super66]

Originally Posted by Paul

You didn't leave the parking brake on, right?

haha..no, not that bad....actually Igot this explanation in my original posting:

"I suspect that the smell you describe is not your tires but the burning of your clutch. Violent launches need to release energy somehow, there are only a few ways. 1) The tires slip and screech. 2) The clutch slips 3) The engine bogs as the rpm matches road speed 4) Something in the transmission breaks."

I think I fell victim to option 3.......

[djomlas]

damn dude...dont trash it

[David N.]

To be fair, #3 is the least wear-inducing. If you were at 4-5 and nothing was happening, chances are your clutch was not all the way engaged. When I was testing out another Boxster for a night that I didn't end up purchasing (for plenty of other reasons), I was driving with the top down on the freeway and got stuck in in bumper to bumper traffic. We were going slightly uphill, so I figured I had to rev it a bit higher to keep the engine from stalling. Well, turns out I was having to keep it at 4-5 and slowing engaging the clutch to do that. Seemed really weird, the hill wasn't that steep. That's when I started to smell it.. I looked down and had a sudden thought, and put it in neutral to check...

It had been in third gear. I was going from a stop to 5mph uphill in third gear. No wonder I was having to slip like crazy. But worse than that I started to have moments where the clutch just refused to fully engage even with my foot off the clutch, basically when it was just so freakin hot. It was the exact same feeling you mentioned, the clutch was out, engine revving, car not going like it should be. Bad news for your clutch.

Once I got up to speed and the clutch had a chance to cool off, it gave me no more troubles. I did a high speed push to see if there was any normal slippage, but it was tight. I guess if the plate and flywheel are near-molten, their ability to hold starts to diminish a LOT.

Moral of the story, clutch out and revs aren't making you go, could be a really hot clutch. Give it a chance to cool and try not to do it again.

-David

[eslai]

I would be really really really surprised if a single incident of clutch slippage was enough to trash the clutch. These things should be able to take a bit more abuse than that!

Is your clutch now slipping in any of the low gears when you drive it hard? If not I don't see any reason you'd change it out. Wait until it dies. Then again I haven't heard the whole story so maybe it really is dead.