Don’t expect anything other than a tirade of expletives about London Black Cab clutches for the next few days. I’ll return to the regular musings about coca cola and American life in a week or so, depending on how long clutch surgery takes.
So the Austin Morris Workshop Manual for the Taxi and Hire Car is about an inch thick. I’d tell you how many pages it has but they aren’t numbered, just irregularly lettered. There’s a bunch of pages, lots of words, and an even more imprecise bundle of diagrams. Covering four models of cars built over a few decades.
Now, I’ve never changed a clutch before. Until yesterday, I’d never even held a newborn one in my hands. So when I eagerly ripped apart the bubble wrap packing around my weighty workshop manual, I was looking for some pretty graphic and in depth descriptions of the tasks required to do such a thing.
Alas, the instructions for taking it off, AND putting it back on again are confined to a quarter of a page. The removal instructions on their own amount to:
“To gain access to the clutch it is first necessary to remove the gearbox from the engine.”
OK so this is described in a little more detail elsewhere in the book, but not much more. It presupposes that I know which bit the gearbox is, and sums something which is a rite of passage for me in just 17 words. It’s like saying, “To cross Africa on a motorcycle, first arrive at the coast of Africa with a motorcycle and then ride towards another coast.” It continues:
“Slacken the clutch cover securing screws a turn at a time by diagonal selection until the spring pressure is relieved. The remove the screws completely and lift the clutch assembly away from the flywheel. Finally, remove the driven plate assembly.”
OK, this bit makes sense. Unscrew some bits until the bits come off. I get this. It’s just all of the necessary steps between the two that require all manner of weird tools, slings and pulleys that elude me. Oh and tool 18G 99A that was probably in every mechanics toolkit 40 years ago that is used for balancing a clutch. What the heck is balancing a clutch? The manual presumes so much.
when you presume you make a “pres” out of you and me
Hey, I’d still vote for you for JCR pres.
10 weeks later and the car emerges from the garage with second, third, fourth and sometimes reverse gears.