So I had a new Sachs clutch kit installed in my 07 JK yesterday by a local mechanic. I drove it home (<1 mile) and all seemed fine. This morning when I started it, I could hear a tapping sound - which went away when the clutch was pushed in - but seemed to get louder as the throttle was increased. I took it back to the mechanic, and he told me the new TOB (release bearing) must be defective.

I did not use the TOB that was in the kit, and instead bought a better one made by National Bearing (Moog). Having read up on the clutch/bearing issues with the JK, I was careful to inspect the bearing before I took it to have it installed - as did the mechanic.

Here's the problem: Since I provided the parts for the job, he will not warranty the labor, so I have to pay him again to tear the trans apart to install another bearing. This is a big job, so I can understand this, but my concern is could this be an installation issue, or is it possible that the brand of bearing is not compatible with the Sachs clutch? If it was installed improperly, what could he have done wrong to cause the bearing to be hitting the pressure plate constantly?

 

Apparently there can be a wrong "preload" on the throwout bearing (TB), at least in some cases. The noise would disappear when you depressed the clutch. There was a TSB back in 07 addressing this;

http://project-jk.com/images/tsb/TSB_06-002-07.pdf

It is a long shot, but had me wondering if the depth dimensions of your new clutch/TB were slightly different than stock, would it affect the "preload" with the stock linkage.

It is probably a bad TB (check the contact face of the pressure plate also) but you want to be sure, else doing the install again will not help.

 

Interesting info on the TSB. I was recently told that the mechanic might have installed the clutch plate in backwards, and/or improperly torqued the pressure plate unevenly causing the bearing to hit the "fingers". It's unlikely that they will admit their mistake, so If I decide to tackle this myself, would you advise me to add the washers as the TSB indicates, or would that only apply to the OEM clutch/bearing? I definitely want to do it right...

 

Sorry I have not been on the site for a bit. It seems to me that if the replacement parts are correct dimensions I don't see why you would have to do the modification the TSB talks about.

Too bad about your experience with that mechanic. He should be refunding all or at least part of your labor charges.

I bet if you hunt around you can find a writeup on changing out the clutch, or maybe even get ahold of the shop manual on CD.