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There's a thread on the other board by Sean Kupra where he's had two V-clutches turn out to be bad (failed open) pretty much out of the box. I too bought a V-Clutch from Cobra in November, and it was also bad out of the box. Sean also reported that Tom at Sportsmachines has also had recent "trouble" with an aftermarket V-clutch.
The symptoms for both Sean and I were that with the front prop shaft out, trans in Drive, brake applied and truck not moving, the front output yoke was spinning. Obviously it shouldn't be if the truck isn't moving. Once the propshaft is installed, everything seems normal. Most peeps won't know the V-clutch is open unless they remove the propahaft or get squirrelly in the rain.
A few years back, these clutches were $385 from Cobra. Now they're $235. If they can be sold this cheaply, my guess is that someone contacted Alibaba, had a batch made in China, and sold them to suppliers, jobbers, and trans shops all over North America. And they are Chinese junk.. There's a ;shop local to me that rebuilds and supplies V-Clutches. I talked to him a few years ago, but never tried one. Sean may be contacting him too. I may follow up on this, because I need to fix the bad one I installed in November. Plus it cost a couple hun. Cobra should be asked to make it right. It's not only the ~$250, but the effort and work to R&R and install it in the case. TWICE!
Anyway, if you have installed an inexpensive V-clutch in the past year or so, there's a very simple test to see if it's any good: Jack up the front wheels with a floor jack and see if you can move the truck under its own power in gear. If the fronts just spin in the air, you have a bad one. And a simple test upon installation of a newly-built T-case would be to see if the truck moves before installing the front propshaft. The bad one I had felt OK for about 5 seconds, then failed miserably.
Just a heads-up..
The symptoms for both Sean and I were that with the front prop shaft out, trans in Drive, brake applied and truck not moving, the front output yoke was spinning. Obviously it shouldn't be if the truck isn't moving. Once the propshaft is installed, everything seems normal. Most peeps won't know the V-clutch is open unless they remove the propahaft or get squirrelly in the rain.
A few years back, these clutches were $385 from Cobra. Now they're $235. If they can be sold this cheaply, my guess is that someone contacted Alibaba, had a batch made in China, and sold them to suppliers, jobbers, and trans shops all over North America. And they are Chinese junk.. There's a ;shop local to me that rebuilds and supplies V-Clutches. I talked to him a few years ago, but never tried one. Sean may be contacting him too. I may follow up on this, because I need to fix the bad one I installed in November. Plus it cost a couple hun. Cobra should be asked to make it right. It's not only the ~$250, but the effort and work to R&R and install it in the case. TWICE!
Anyway, if you have installed an inexpensive V-clutch in the past year or so, there's a very simple test to see if it's any good: Jack up the front wheels with a floor jack and see if you can move the truck under its own power in gear. If the fronts just spin in the air, you have a bad one. And a simple test upon installation of a newly-built T-case would be to see if the truck moves before installing the front propshaft. The bad one I had felt OK for about 5 seconds, then failed miserably.
Just a heads-up..
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