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Clutch is gone in My 03 cl, I need to replace it but don't feel like paying a mechanic. I never replaced a clutch before and I know its difficult and time consuming but i'm pretty mechanically inclined, unfortunately I can seem to find any DIY or tutorials for my car. If body every did a clutch job on this car please let me know exactly how difficult it will be or any tips you may have for me. Also, could i follow a DIY for cars similar to mines like fot a 03 tl or accord 6spd and just improvise, any known DIY's would be greatly appreciated.
Are you doing it in your driveway? Our flywheel is a dual mass, alot of people say you can't resurface them. Im doing 6 speed/3.5 swap at the same time, I had mine resurfaced because I'm on a budget, but if I had a Lil extra I would get a new flywheel. I feel like you need to use a torch to get exhaust bolts off, and you should be able to unbolt the front half of the subframe and left the rear one in car. Front and rear mounts are a pain, but not impossible. It really depends on how rusty the car is. You should be able to unbolt the clutch slave and let it hang, but be careful to not bend/brake the line. You won't have to bleed it when you put it back. Make sure to clean up inside of trans real good and put only a Lil grease on the shaft and where throw out bearing sits. Don't put too much or you can contaminate your new clutch.
I went thru this when i first picked up my CLs. I had high hopes to do it myself, driveway style, after researching, there are a few centering tools among others that are specific to the car.
After procing out JUST the tools, it would have been half of the labr cost.
I eneded up paying a local guy who strictly does Acura, roughly 1/2 a G note.
He hooked it up as he was excited to work on my car. He never did a clutch on a CLs. Hes my trouble shoot guy if and when i get stumped.
Went factory oem for the clutch
Consider all exspenses prior to diving in to into yourself. Speciality tools etc
The manual is def good to have. I prefer the physical book. Mine was $60, also 6 years ago
Just did mine in April. You will need to pull off front half of sub frame. You should use a special tool to press the diaphragm spring on the pressure plate before tightening it up, but some people have done it carefully without. I decided to buy the tool as a I have 2-3 more other cars that need clutch jobs too and have SAC clutch also. You can let the slave hang out of the way with ty-wraps and not break the line. It was one of the more involved clutch jobs but wasn't impossible, probably an 8/10 on difficulty. I did it on jack stands in my garage, took my time and took about 3 days, working on it ~6 hours a day. Had to repair some threads that were galled up. Replaced ALL mounts. Had a stuck lower ball joint etc.
I also recommend getting an engine support bar that goes across the strut towers to support the engine while it hangs with the trans out. I also used mine to help support the weight of the trans while I stabbed it back onto the engine single handed. $80 from harbour freight.
I just posted this in another thread:
Just did my clutch in April. I bought the LUK clutch parts almost 18 months ago tho and paid about $170 for the LuK rep set & about $200 for the LuK DMF from what I remember, off ebay. You may need less than $100 in other misc parts like rear main seal, trans fluid as mentioned etc. I expected my RMS to be leaking but found once in there it was a small o-ring on the RMS cover plate. So replace that too. I also bought things like several cans of brake clean to clean the trans, a couple of taps to clean up threads in a couple of bolt holes that were galled etc etc. I think you could easily do just the clutch for <$500 if doing the work yourself. My clutch is the smoothest engaging clutch I've had on a car now.
I also replaced EVERY engine mount and both damper struts while I was in there (car has 250K on it) so that was an extra $700 or so. The only 2 mounts that were bad though were the front & side, and one of the damper struts was leaking a bit of oil, not much tho.
I just replaced my clutch at 251,XXX miles... thank you Mordor for your post.. It was a great help for me in getting up the courage to tackle this clutch job...I did everything you said but wanted to add some stuff... If you are just doing the clutch you can hold the motor up from the bottom with a jack.. I dropped the front sub frame with the front motor mount and transmission mounts attached.. I removed the 3 14mm bolts that attach the mount bar to the transmission.. It was a challenge but I have done clutch jobs before.. (last one I did was a 1991 Acura legend 4 door ls.. I missed that car).. just take your time.. think of it like eating a elephant.. one bite at a time.. I grouped my bolts and parts together to ease the "which bolt goes where" thing.. also if you like buying life time warranty parts you will be happy to know that the clutch kit from Autozone is also a LUK product (although the box says Duralast).. I spent $312.69 (with tax) for the clutch kit and replaced my transmission oil with the Honda manual tranny fluid ($10 a quart.. wow) Autozone has the slave cylinder but you have to use the one from a 2004-08 TL... It's like $105 at Autozone...the one they have listed for the CL type S has a funny angle to it.. that one is $31.79 (with tax).. If you don't have the 105 to spend and the slave cylinder shell has not be compromised you can buy the cheaper one and just use the internal piston and spring assembly...I didn't use any special tool other than the pilot tool use to align the disk that came with the clutch kit.. there is a certain tightening sequence with the pressure plate but all that is explained with the instructions you get in the clutch kit.. I did a quarter of a turn on each bolt in the star sequence as shown...this with tighten down the pressure plate more evenly.. half a turn then moved to the next then start the sequence all over again.. just tightening a half of a turn until the screws are tight...
06-06-2016, 02:48 PM
.. It was a great help for me in getting up the courage to tackle this clutch job...I did everything you said but wanted to add some stuff... If you are just doing the clutch you can hold the motor up from the bottom with a jack.. I dropped the front sub frame with the front motor mount and transmission mounts attached.. I removed the 3 14mm bolts that attach the mount bar to the transmission.. It was a challenge but I have done clutch jobs before.. (last one I did was a 1991 Acura legend 4 door ls.. I missed that car).. just take your time.. think of it like eating a elephant.. one bite at a time.. I grouped my bolts and parts together to ease the "which bolt goes where" thing.. also if you like buying life time warranty parts you will be happy to know that the clutch kit from Autozone is also a LUK product (although the box says Duralast).. I spent $312.69 (with tax) for the clutch kit and replaced my transmission oil with the Honda manual tranny fluid ($10 a quart.. wow
) Autozone has the slave cylinder but you have to use the one from a 2004-08 TL... It's like $105 at Autozone...the one they have listed for the CL type S has a funny angle to it.. that one is $31.79 (with tax).. If you don't have the 105 to spend and the slave cylinder shell has not be compromised you can buy the cheaper one and just use the internal piston and spring assembly...I didn't use any special tool other than the pilot tool use to align the disk that came with the clutch kit.. there is a certain tightening sequence with the pressure plate but all that is explained with the instructions you get in the clutch kit.. I did a quarter of a turn on each bolt in the star sequence as shown...this with tighten down the pressure plate more evenly.. half a turn then moved to the next then start the sequence all over again.. just tightening a half of a turn until the screws are tight...
