Skip to main content

Bellhousing & Clutch fork removal

Removing the bellhousing from the Porsche 944 engine is not as complicated as it may seem - such as in this situation with my replacement engine. When I removed the original engine I detached it from the bellhousing in the car and removed the clutch pressure plate bolts through the starter motor hole - see my other post for details.

In this case I decided to remove the clutch fork pivot shaft bolt.

Begin by removing the four 17mm bellhousing bolts - you'll find that the bellhousing doesn't detach completely from the engine.

It'll feel like its hooking on something. That something is the clutch fork pivot shaft inside the bellhousing. The bellhousing will be loose enough to rotate - turn it 180 degrees and peek through the access port which is now on top - this is what you'll see:


If the engine is still in car you'll be looking at this from underneath.

The pivot shaft needs to be extracted from the clutch fork. It's held in place by a small bolt on the underside of the bell housing - remove that 10mm bolt.

The hollow threaded pivot shaft now needs to be removed - you can see it in the image below to the left of the large hole for the starter motor.




Insert an M6 bolt into the threads inside the shaft - I used a long bolt from the alternator pivot with a washer passed through a small spanner - you'll use the spanner to tap with a hammer to slide the shaft out by gently tapping it:




Screw the bolt into the shaft as far as it will go:

Thankfully this shaft was well greased and was easily removed - otherwise you'll need to be tapping that spanner pretty hard to get it to budge. Once it's going it just slides out:


Inside the bell housing youll find the loose clutch fork - don't drop it and damage it. Apparently they're hard to find new...


With the clutch fork pivot shaft removed the bellhousing will slide off freely revealing the back of the clutch pressure plate. The clutch pressure plate is removed by undoing the 6mm Allen head bolts in the starter ring as can be seen below. Be careful - the pressure plate is very heavy!


At the centre of this assembly is the the clutch release bearing and laid on its back reveals the clutch friction material which presses up against the flywheel when engaged:



The clutch friction plate simply slides out:


The flywheel will remain attached to the engine. From here the pilot bearing can be accessed easily enough...


If the pressure plate bolts are removed through the starter motor hole then the bell housing can be removed without extracting the shaft. That's the way I separated the engine from the bell housing when I pulled the original engine.

Comments

  1. Nice post, thank you for sharing. You have really imparted useful knowledge. A very useful post I must say. Awesome content. I bookmarked it for future reference.
    Tractor Parts

    ReplyDelete
  2. Everyone dreams of having his own house. If you too want to have your own house, read this blog where you will find tips to help you find your dream house.

    Prestige Sector 150 Noida

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ramin Fallah While Iran
    Would-be medical exec from Iran barred from Canada over alleged ties to Tehran's nuclear program. Ramin Fallah was labeled a security threat because he ...
    You've visited this page many times. Last visit: 5/12/21

    ReplyDelete
  4. ATS Floral Pathway

    FLoor Plan

    Location Map

    Just read your post and would like to thank you for maintaining such a cool blog.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Yeah, it's easy when the engine isn't in the car

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Engine out the top - Easy Peasy

After reading numerous posts, the Porsche workshop manual and Clarks Garage step-by-step engine removal guide - I felt confident enough to tackle the job. But I wanted to remove the engine from the top.  As I discovered, it was pretty straight forward even for a novice! Result. I wanted to avoid removing the cross member and disturb the front suspension to do something I was convinced could be done easier from the top. Posts such as this one convinced me to give it a go at least. And I'm glad I did. In summary I was able to remove the engine from the top without needing to remove the bonnet/hood; torque tube; transaxle; bellhousing; clutch; clutch slave cylinder; cross member; front suspension; and radiator. Contrary to many so called internet experts opinions and many confusing threads this was painless and without dread. All that was necessary to remove was the starter; power steering pump and alternator (I figured to make the bottom of the engine narrower); intak

New Steering shaft bearing Nightmare removal

In my quest to tighten up the handling on the 944, I bought a new Needle Bearing from Porsche in an attempt to eliminate the fore-aft play in the steering at the top universal joint. The part number for the replacement is 477.419.059 and costs £88.86 posted from an OPC. Nothing like the effort required to actually remove the old one... I began the process by reading section 48 of Porsche Workshop manual. It appeared a simple enough process but two things bothered me: firstly, it required a chisel to remove a shear bolt (which in my limited experience never "shear"; and secondly a drill to remove two screws from the ignition lock. I was bothered because a quick look under the dashboard made it quite obvious that whoever had written the manual hadn't performed this task - well not without a dashboard in place that's for sure. I was bothered before I'd even started. Furthermore, the manual doesn't detail the replacement of this bearing at all - just the rem