[TR] Brakes vs. clutch

[Jim Muller]

On 13 May 2009 at 14:03, Nolan wrote:

> Well I'd personally rather not lose my brakes because my clutch
> sprung a leak, but that's just me.

Same here.  I've never (knock on wooden dashboard and wooden head) 
had brake failure but I did experience clutch hydraulics failure 
years ago.  We were in the Spitfire top-down and had just pulled off 
the road to check some directions, when a wicked big dog came tearing 
around the nearest house, seriously angry, showing his teeth and 
barking with sense of purpose.  But the car wouldn't go into gear!  
Fortunately a sense of panic made me double-pump the clutch pedal and 
that did the trick.  When I go home I found my left shoe was covered 
with brake fluif.  So it was the MC, not the SC, even though the SC 
is more exposed to the road.

So I got to thinking about why the clutch system would fail.  A bit 
of analysis says that the clutch gets far more use than the brake.  
At every stop you hit the brakes maybe once or twice, not necessarily 
full displacement of the pedal.  But when you pull away from that 
stop you always use the clutch at least once to go into 1st then 
again to go into 2nd.  It heavy traffic it may be even more.  Often 
you use it once or twice more to go into 3rd or 4th.  On the road you 
may shift around between the higher gears without using the brake at 
all.  Every clutch operation should be done with full displacement of 
the pedal.  It wouldn't surprise me if the clutch seals gets 3 to 5 
times as much wear as the brake seals.

I'd rather not have my brakes dependent on another system that is 
that much more likely to leak.

-- 
Jim Muller
jimmuller at rcn.com
'80 Spitfire, '70 GT6+