4 Smart Ways to Use Your Clutch Perfectly and Extend Its Lifespan
by Debra Morgan
Almost all cars with manual gearboxes have highly essential clutches. However, they are susceptive to wear when misused. Since these auto parts are highly expensive, you should consider how to use the clutch properly. Therefore, acknowledge the following tips to help you improve the lifespan of your car's clutch.
When Changing Your Gears
One of the crucial points to reduce clutch wear is paying attention to clutch plates and where they meet. For instance, if the clutch reaches the biting point, it's crucial to let go of the pedal to avoid causing excess wear through clutch slippage. However, always remember that the biting point is not the same on every vehicle.
When changing gear, press the pedal rapidly and then change your gear stick slowly before releasing the clutch. Do all this while avoiding overly slow speeds that cause slippage or too fast speeds that cause rough gear changes. Through regular driving, you can find out where your clutch biting point is located. Therefore, accurately changing your gears minimises the engagement time for clutch disks.
When Braking the Engine
You apply engine braking when you need to slow down your vehicle. As such, you avoid the clutch to retain the link between the engine and gearbox. This type of braking is useful, especially when driving downhill, since it's not advisable to use brakes continuously on steep inclines.
Additionally, brakes can overheat and quickly cause brake fade and become less effective when you most need them. And braking on slopes consequently wears down the brake pads even faster. When you realise that your engine is choking, try depressing the clutch and switch down a gear.
When Driving Your Car
During driving classes, your trainer may say that riding your clutch is the most useful way to operate it. This way, you exert light pressure to the clutch pedal to hold it down permanently to allow for quicker gear changes. However, this habit is not recommended, and you need to quit doing that immediately. When you keep pressing your foot on the clutch pedal, it engages the clutch disks and puts friction and strain on the parts.
When Stopping the Car
Sometimes it's tempting to keep your clutch in engaged mode partially or fully when at traffic lights or in slow-moving traffic. When you do this, you put more strain on the clutch and cause more wear to the parts. Therefore, you should change your gear to neutral and engage your clutch more quickly rather than keeping it under strain and friction for long.
Reach out to an auto service for help with your car's brake and clutch system.
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About Me
I've been running an auto service shop for the past 30 years. The trends in cars have changed a lot over that time, and cars are becoming a lot more complicated and automated. People can't fix many items on their own cars any more as you need a computer to diagnose most issues. People use their cars a lot more these days as we live further away from workplaces and schools so it's important for me to be able to get cars back quickly. I have had to keep learning about how the new cars run and I keep a lot of hints on this site so you can all learn the things you can do to make your cars run better.