clutch adjustment on Triumph Herald

Is there any way to adjust the travel on the clutch pedal on a 1969 Triumph Herald 1200. At the moment the clutch does not dis-engage until about 1" from the floor (without carpets), resulting in plenty of gear crunching - mainly 1st & 2nd and it is quite a strain on my old knee! The clutch plates are fairly new (10,000 miles)

Cheers Ron

Reply to
Ron
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From unreliable memory push rod was adjustable on the herald but this won't help it sounds like a hydrualic problem -- try bleeding the system if that dosent work but a kit in the master cylinder (may as weel do slave at same time)

Reply to
Neadhyl Wroller

I doubt they were ever adjustable, there would be no way of doing so (other than shimming the slave cylinder to bell housing mounting point) but IIRC there were different lengths of push rod depending on engine cc and clutch.

Reply to
Jerry.

In general if it's that bad something has worn to failure point rather than needing adjustment. If you need to top up with fluid then you've lost some, not a good thing - it can go bad after years and isn't much of a job to change. However I would think your problem is not hydraulic but mechanical. Have a word with Dave at

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the standard clutch is not adjustable but Canley's make an adjustable push rod. Be advised that the problem may be failure of the release lever, they crack at the pivot. This means a replacement (box in the car if I remember correctly) again available from Canley's for not a lot.

Reply to
J

mechanical.

The pivot pin can drop out, this will cause lost throw, I strongly suggest the OP check that the pin is still present. IIRC the pin can be replaced without removing box or engine.

Reply to
Jerry.

Hi Ron, The clutch was adjustable on only the earliest Heralds, the feature was deleted during 1960.

Has it been like this since the clutch was fitted, or has it gradually worsened? If the latter, then as the other posters have mentioned, something has failed - check those points mentioned, as well as looking for play in the master cylinder's clevis pin. If on the other hand the clutch has had a very low bite point since it was installed, chances are you have one of the newer Delphi Borg & Beck clutches installed. Though supposedly a direct replacement for the original, these introduce a greater degree of free play between the release bearing and the fingers on the clutch cover. As such, the piston only works along the last

2/3rds of it's travel before hitting the retaining circlip. Solution? There are a few options, simplest being to open out the pinchbolt slot in the slave cylinder so that it can be slid forward. Another option is making an extended pushrod. The third and most elegant solution is to have a new bearing carrier made to move the thrust bearing closer to the clutch cover. This would of course involve dismantling and machine shop work, so not a quick fix. Cheers, Bill Davies.
Reply to
Bill Davies

As others have said, check the pivot pin. Quite often falls out, and gets replaced by bolts at garages. The threads on the bolt then wear off, making it thinner, when it's already thinner to start with. Makes for a fair amount of slack in the system.

Also, I found quite a lot of play in the pedal on one of my cars, which turned out to be a very tired clevis pin (? - The one with the hole for the split pin, it's too late to remember properly now). Changed that, and instantly had a much better pedal.

It is possible to maybe shove the slave cylinder further into the carrier, which helps too.

Reply to
Stuffed

It's worth pointing out that as this is a lever/fulcrum arrangement small amounts of play translate to bigger distance of pedal travel - the last poster reminded me of a similar situation I'd seen in a Vitesse where there was a little play in everything but seemingly not enough to worry about. In desperation the owner went through and reconditioned the whole lot, result? Superb pedal feel, action and travel and we still couldn't see anything standing out as worn out in the stuff we took off.

Reply to
J

Pure coincidence, look what's just been listed on ebay

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financial interest on my part - check what the new price is first though,if they are still available that is!

Reply to
J

All the other posts are right, especially the one that says a little bit of play in each item doesn't seem much, but it all adds up.

The one thing that I don't think has been mentioned yet is that the hole in the top of the brake pedal wears oval, and IMHO tends to be the biggest culprit.

Most secondhand pedals will be as bad as your own, but you can use a brake pedal, which normally has less wear, the angle is different, so you need to get it in a vice and 'adjust' it with a hammer.

Another bodge is to weld (or superglue if your a real cowboy) a couple of washers onto the pedal, and drill the holes out to the right size for the pin.

I did this on a spitfire the other day, and also enlarged the slot in the slave cylinder as one of the other posts mentioned which did the trick.

Good Luck with it

Dave Jones

Reply to
Dave Jones

Whoops, first mention of brake pedal is obviously meant to read clutch pedal

Reply to
Dave Jones

If it wasn't I would not like to be following you as you pulled away from the lights !....

Reply to
Jerry.

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