LuK Clutch Products

RockAuto now offers more LuK clutch products than ever before! Original Equipment (OE) on roughly four out of five new cars and light trucks in North America and a quarter of all new vehicles built world-wide, LuK is known for its high quality OE and replacement parts.

When you install a LuK clutch kit, you restore or even improve OE performance. Designed and engineered to perfectly match the unique characteristics of the vehicle’s engine and transmission, every LuK clutch kit is tested and guaranteed to meet critical performance specifications, including torque capacity, material hardness, hub spline tolerance, wear capacity, clamp load, pressure plate lift and torsional vibration dampening.

Along with Clutch Kits, LuK also offers other clutch components including Clutch Master Cylinders, Clutch Slave Cylinders, Master & Slave Assemblies, and Flywheels. All LuK products are backed with their 12 month warranty and include industry leading technical support online, on-call and in print.

Find the LuK product(s) you need for your specific car or truck under the "Transmission-Manual" category in the RockAuto catalog.

Forum of the Month

TurboFord.org has been sharing information about Ford’s 2.3 Turbo engine with thousands of active members since the early days of the Internet. The site is about this particular engine and not any specific vehicle. Mustang SVOs, Mustang GT Turbos, Capri RSs, Thunderbird Turbo Coupes, Cougar XR-7s and Merkurs are all welcome. TurboFord.org also has many members with vehicles the engine has been swapped into such as Pintos, Rangers, British sports cars, sand rails and others.

Topics include performance and upgrades, repairs and troubleshooting, engine swaps, racing and many more technical topics about the 2.3 turbo.

If you are the administrator or member of a forum and you would like to see your website featured in an upcoming newsletter and receive a discount code to share with your members, contact marketing@rockauto.com.

Repair Mistakes & Blunders

I was driving my well-maintained, low-mileage 2003 Tundra to work one routine day when it died. After getting it towed home, I removed the timing belt covers and found the belt had jumped four to eight teeth due to a bad tensioner pulley bearing. Fearing damage to this interference engine, I performed an air leak-down test and found the passenger side good, but the driver’s side questionable.

I replaced all the timing belt components and with the fuel relay pulled, I checked the engine compression - finding the passenger side on spec but the driver’s side half of the spec. Fearing bent valves or worse, I pushed it out of my garage to decide what to do next.

After some research, I decided to tackle the head removal myself. Now I needed to push the truck back into my garage. The slight uphill to my garage was going to take a big effort so I decided to go ahead and fire up the engine. To my surprise, it ran OK with just a slight noise on the “bad side.”

I let the engine warm up to properly re-check the compression. To my surprise both sides were all good and above spec! Turns out it is very important to remove all the plugs when checking compression, not just one at a time! The noise was due to a slight alignment issue on the belt-driven cooling fan (that’s a different repair blunder story).

Don’t make my mistake. When performing a compression check, when the instructions say “remove the plugs” it means remove ALL the plugs!

Greg in Florida

Tell us about your most infamous auto repair blunder or unconventional fix. Use your woe to help others avoid similar mistakes or share off-the-wall solutions that worked (at least for a while!). Please email your story to flamur@rockauto.com. Include your mailing address and if you would like a RockAuto T-Shirt (please let us know your shirt size) or Hat if we publish your story. See the T-Shirts and Hats under Tools & Universal Parts in the catalog. The story will be credited using only your first name and your vague geographic location (state, province, country, continent, etc.) so you can remain semi-anonymous!

Automotive Trivia

What is a slinger?

A. An option package for the Dodge Dart beginning in 1969.
B. A metal ring that helps distribute lubricant evenly over the surfaces of a bearing and/or keeps out contaminates.
C. The part of a windshield wiper transmission that forces the wipers to reverse direction at the end of their stroke path.

Answer below

It Probably Still Uses a Belt

Mechanical fuel pumps went away in the '80s and hydraulic power steering pumps are now disappearing from new cars too. The water pump is the one pump that has not gone electric. Unless the vehicle has a hybrid or electric powertrain, then it probably still uses a belt to spin the impeller inside the water pump.

One thing I never thought enough about, even after replacing a lot of water pumps, is the direction of rotation of the water pump impeller. Direction of impeller rotation may be crucial knowledge if you work on '80s Jeeps, swap engines between vehicles or if you choose to modify the accessory drive belt system on about any engine. If the water pump is spinning in the wrong direction, then the engine will overheat.

The introduction of serpentine belts back in the '80s and '90s also made water pumps with "reverse rotation" common. Both water pumps shown below fit the Jeep (and AMC) four cylinder from the '80s and early '90s, but the impellers on the pumps are designed to spin in opposite directions. The pump with "standard rotation" is designed to be driven by a V-belt or the ribbed side of a serpentine belt while the pump with "reverse rotation" is designed to be driven by the back/smooth side of a serpentine belt.

Before installing a water pump that has been sitting in your stash of parts for years or choosing a new water pump from RockAuto for the engine installed in your custom hot rod, it is a good idea to check to see if the impellers and belt pulleys match. The smooth pulley on the "Chevy 350" water pump in the image below is meant to be driven by the back/smooth side of a serpentine belt. That means it is a water pump with reverse rotation and cannot be driven by a V-belt or the ribbed side of a serpentine belt.

Reverse Rotation Pumps have a Smooth Pulley, which runs on the back side of the belt.	Standard Rotation Pumps have a Grooved Pulley, which runs on the inside of the drive belt.

Tom Taylor,
RockAuto.com

To read more of Tom's articles, click this link and choose from story titles on the Newsletter Archives page.

Carl's 1962 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport

G'day guys,

I've been buying parts from you for my Impala for several years, so it's about time I told you about it. It's a 1962 Chevrolet Impala Super Sport Sports Coupe that was sold new in Little Rock, Arkansas. The original owners had it from 1962 until 1983. It passed through several other owners and eventually ended up in California. It was imported to Australia in 2004 and I bought it in 2010. It's an original Anniversary Gold car, 1962 being the 50th anniversary of Chevrolet so they offered this color to celebrate. It has the original 327 V8, automatic and is a factory air conditioned car. I have all the original owners manuals and a copy of the original 1962 Certificate of Title from when it was sold new by the dealership in Little Rock. I'm still in contact with the son of the original owners, and have also contacted the dealership, which was happy that a car they sold over 50 years ago is still going strong.

Being in Australia, I have to trust that overseas companies will deliver great prices and prompt and reasonable shipping rates to Australia, and you guys are terrific. I buy all my consumable and OEM parts from you, including steering, brakes, filters, engine and drivetrain components.

All the best,
Carl in Australia

Automotive Trivia Answer
	What is a slinger? A. An option package for the Dodge Dart beginning in 1969. Answer B. A metal ring that helps distribute lubricant evenly over the surfaces of a bearing and/or keeps out contaminates. C. The part of a windshield wiper transmission that forces the wipers to reverse direction at the end of their stroke path. Back up to trivia question

© 1999-2016 RockAuto, LLC - Madison, Wisconsin USA. RockAuto name, logo and ALL THE PARTS YOUR CAR WILL EVER NEED are registered trademarks of RockAuto, LLC. Manufacturer names and logos in the RockAuto catalog are trademarks of their respective companies and are used only to identify their products. All rights reserved.