CLUTCHES

A clutch has one job in your car - to transfer the power from the engine to the gearbox, via the flywheel. Now, obviously, you’ll be wanting as many of those lovely horses as possible to be transferred across, hopefully without eating your clutch or flywheel along the way. Perhaps what’s most important is the last bit, there’s no point in having any clutch if it explodes every 5-minutes… although there’s equally no hero points achieved for having a highly-tuned engine where all the power goes to waste in a huge cloud of smoke and slippage either.

The truth is that, when there’s any sort of engine tuning or fruity driving thrown into the mix, then the extra torque or extreme conditions your clutch has to endure can make it struggle to cope. Still, that’s where uprated performance clutches come in, these are designed specifically to ease the burden and keep you on track. Here’s what you need to know…

THE SCIENCE

A conventional clutch setup has three main parts – the clutch plate (otherwise known as the disc), the release bearing and the cover. These work in conjunction with the flywheel to make your car move.

The plate is the part that includes a specially-engineered friction surface, in that way it’s not unlike a big