sunday school/raybestos blue plates

[chris718]

i drove into the shop today at 10 am.drove the gn with 100 miles on a trans that is to be shipped tuesday.pulled it down and installed some of the 2nd generation blue plates for the direct clutch raybestos sent to me for testing and evaluation.i was reluctant to install them ,however i did it anyway,beings the wife and daughter are away for the week and i was bored.at 12 .30 i started reinstalling the trans with 2nd gens on the same trans i drove in with and at 1.30 the starter motor cranked over the engine and i added the same trans oil i took out.went for a road test babying it to break in the direct frictions .after about 15 light throttle 2/3 shifts i felt the shift get slightly firmer and i now was ready to beat them to death .found a dead block by the river and power braked the car in overdrive until it shifted 3 times and i smoked out the whole block.wide open from a dead stop shifted 1/2 at 5300 identical to how it was before and at right about the same rpm at wot it shifted 2/3.no improvement in shift quality,it actually shifted softer.puled over checed the oil level and watched the pressure gage to verify all was well .at wot on the 1/2 i dropped 5 psi and at wot on the 2/3 you couldnt even see the needle move.drove around for an hour or so beating this thing to death and no improvement.my conclusion is the red alto friction in the exact operating conditions as the 2nd gen blue plates still shifts firmer and locks the direct drum to the forward drum faster on a ratio change with our calibration.

 

[jakeshoe]

Chris,
Are you going to be removing these clutches?

Let us know how they look...

Did you use Kolenes or stock type steels?

From your experience using the Blues when you do have some type of sealiing or pressure failure and the clutches see alot of heat, how do they look?
And how do the Alto Reds look?

Has Raybestos ever put out any literature as to the co-efficient of friction with these plates?

Alto has a tech sheet on theirs comparing them to other major OEM clutches, assuming BW's and Rays..

I would like to see something similar on the Blue's.

I have only used them a couple of times but have had good luck using the red's. I had a iron sealing ring break once and smoked the forwards in a TH350 (yes I use teflon only now...) anyway the red's were smoked but not really toasted like a stock type clutch would have been.
They had seen 15-20 miles of in town stoplight to stoplight slippage trying to limp home.
Honestly, a person probably could have fixed the sealing ring and ran the trans again...

Any good literature on the Kolene steels?

I usually stick with Alto's and stock steels, they've treated me good to the 700 hp range and most of my stuff is in the 400-600 range...

Here's one of mine...
need to get pics of the low 10 second '75 Camaro with TH350 launching