[DeTomaso] Clutch Master Cylinders and Engine Mounts

JDeRyke at aol.com JDeRyke at aol.com
Wed Oct 23 21:10:51 EDT 2013


OEM clutch masters were made of a particularly soft, corrosion-prone cast 
iron. In addition, they had a very simple seal with no back-up. Finally, 
owners do not change clutch fluid (or brake fluid, either) yearly, and the fluid 
sucks moisture out of the air and stores it inside where it rusts the bore. 
All the above add to damage and leaks. There are no exact rebuild kits and 
adapting a FIAT, Alfa or GM rebuild kit (all have been used over the years) 
for a similar clutch master is iffy as honing increases the MS bore and the 
simple seal can't compensate for much extra size. But NOT honing the bore 
usually tears a new seal on existing corrosion pits.

Adapting other brand clutch masters causes problems since the bolt spacing 
for the OEM part is narrower than is commonly used. Sometimes, on some 
adaptions, the bolt holes can be elongated inward so as to fit. Other problems 
are- the bore of the mouning hole in the Pantera clutch/brake mounting plate 
on the firewall may be too small, requiring more file work. And the length of 
the actuating rod between master cylinder and pedal clevis is critical on a 
Pantera. All this and more is in an article in the upcoming Nov POCA 
Newsletter.
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The engine was pretty close to centered in the Pantera chassis, but it 
doesn't have to be. Pantera engine mounts are die-cast aluminum with large 
metric bolts that hold the bases to the frame. The excessively strong stock 
metric-equivalent gr-5 type bolts are close to 7/16" OD and can be changed to 
gr-5 SAE 5/16" with self-locking nuts. This allows you to shift the whole 
powertrain to the right side in the drilled holes provided for stock bolts, for a 
little extra header clearance, as GTS headers typically will touch the 
3-layer gas tank heat shield. The small compound angle generated by moving 
things like this does nothing to the halfshaft u-joint life. THe ZF mounts can be 
left alone and no wires, hoses of lines need be shifted..

Loosening the tank strap and prying the tank left towards the outside of 
the car, then retightening the strap- plus denting the shield also makes more 
header pipe clearance. I suggest prying the tank when its nearly empty since 
a full tank will have something like 135 pounds of gasoline in it, and the 
steel tank is extremely thin. It's easy to puncture or even tear the tank 
walls while prying with a sharp edged flat-blade screwdriver. I'd use a 
crowbar or tape up the long screwdriver blade end. Good luck- J Deryke
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