cmac

so like the title says.... whats the difference between the facings on clutches? i see organic, feramic, ceramic, and kevlar. and then there is the combanations of feramic/organic..... ceramic/kevlar....... so whats the difference? besides the fact that they are different materials. thanks

Hercules

Not that I'm an expert on this topic by any measure, but, I'll explain what I have found to be the best way for me to view what the facings offer. In a nut shell, grip and some measure of drivability forgiveness/grabbiness. Starting with organic and working your way to ceramic, you are basicly increasing two things...grabbiness and ability to hold torque. Organic will give you great drivability at the expensive of the power it can hold. On the opposite side of the spectrum, ceramic will hold lots of torque, but are very grabby. Someone once told me that ceramics are kind of like "drop the clutch and go types...they don't slip easily for stop and go traffic." The rest of the facings fall in between those two. The combination clutches, like organic/feramic, are used to create a balance between grabbiness and everyday driveability by providing more grip(feramic) on one side of the plate while allowing for some forgiveness/slip(organic) on the other side. Like I said, I'm no expert on this, so, if I'm way off base on this hopefully someone will correct me or explain it better.

cmac

thanks for the response! does anyone have any experience with kevlar clutches? and is feramic a mix or organic and ceramic or what is it? thanks again

SO5.9

Feramic is an iron facing on both sides of the disc. I have one and like it pretty well. If I had it to do all over again id probably go with a dual disc. The FE clutch is pretty jumpy especially if trying to back with a heavy load.

Dglass89

kevlar clutchs are very hard to hurt and very grabby from what i have been told you can slip a kevlar clutch go home get in it the next morning and shes good as new... thats what i was told "correct me if im wrong"

South Bend Clutch

Absolutely the opposite. Kevlar although being a great material when used in the right application is awesome but if slipped will turn to ash and you are done. The heat tolerance is only 600 degrees.

Peter

cmac

Peter,

what kind of facing would you recomend for the truck in my sig? i do a little drag racing for fun and only tow a little bit hardly ever over 8K pounds. i dont mind a "graby" clutch, the one in it now is a ceramic one but i made the mistake of trying to go the cheap route 2 years ago, it was grabby at first and lets just say it didnt hold up to good. so i got what i paid for... looking at prices the dual discs are out of my price range.

thanks guys for all the help!!

-Mac

Jvenne86

i have a kevlar/ceramic clutch and its true once you slip it, it just gets bad in a hurry. i have less than 10000 miles on mine.

South Bend Clutch

Back in the mid 90's we used Kevlar for the diesel trucks and it worked well. Once the power started coming on it reared its ugly head and forced us to come up with different materials. Companies today will use kevlar to counteract the ceramic buttons harshness. This will work but I feel dangerous because of the lack of heat tolerance and the amount of torque that can be produced in todays trucks.

Peter

cmac

so sounds like kevlar is out of the question.... i'd rather have it grab than slip. the problem i'm having now is the ceramic clutch i bought is slipping pretty bad, the truck isnt near as much fun to drive right now since i have to drive like a g-ma all the time and i really cant get out of my own way

so is ceramic a pretty good material to use? the one i have now only has six ceramic buttons on it (or whatever they are called). or am i going to run into the same issues down the road? i'd like it to last alot longer than two years... one of which i was deployed so it only got like 6,000 miles from the wife last year.

JSPulliam21

A good ceramic clutch is going to be grabby. No way around it. I do not think that the feramic clutches are nearly as grabby as the ceramic. Depending on how far you want to go, and OFe might be enough.