New Clutch Slipping.....oil damn it!

At the beginning of last year I did Katos clutch, no problem. To date it's only done a few thousand miles.
OK so just the last few weeks I've been giving a lot of high speed rides out in Kato with some drifting thrown in. All went well until last weekend when I really went for it with 3 sets of people 12 in total.
On returning to base and doing my checks I realised my oil pressure sender had somehow gone loose and was leaking oil onto the clutch inspection door, from there it found its way onto the clutch plate.....bummer!
On taking Kato out last night I found I couldn't even overtake and was forced to drive on 1/3 power the whole night. This morning I removed the inspection cover and found a thin film of oil on everything including the flywheel.
The Solution:
Well it was either remove the clutch and clean it or get creative.....we got creative ha ha.
Emily and I decided to wash the clutch in situ by rotating the engine to the various points where we could see the flywheel and clutch plate together, then Emily pressed the clutch to open the gap over the contact area.
Then with a powerful jet wash and oil busting detergent, I power washed it through the access hole, rotating the engine to the 3 points where the clutch plate was most visible.
Next up, we ran the engine and hot water lanced the rotating clutch and flywheel assembly whilst Emily pumped the clutch pedal. Pumping the pedal opens the gap between the flywheel and the plate enabling it to be cleaned. The result is as you can see in the pictures, one hell of a clean clutch assembly.

Well did it work?
YES HOORAY!!

We took Kato out for some fairly hard testing and the clutch slip has totally gone, we've been out all day and all's well. On returning I removed the inspection cover and felt the flywheel, it's squeeky clean, completely dry and oil free.

So there you go sometimes an odd solution can really save a lot of time and I'm very happy with this fix.
As for the offending oil sender, a 1/4 turn and it's tight again and NOT leaking now.
Anyway just thought I'd fill you Folks in on my latest, all the best Bell
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Ha ha cheers Jonathan, it looks nice and clean now doesn't it (see pic), my bell housing was like a washing machine with the engine running and all that washing detergent.....I was tempted to put my socks and pants in for a cycle or two.
Anyway, just sods law about the sender leaking and getting the clutch like that. All's well now though, sometimes odd things happen, that's machines for you.

PS. Kato now smells like a laundrette!

 

Hi Soucorp, the bell housing is open at the bottom and so the water goes right through.
The clutch release bearing is sealed as is the pinion support bearing, the starter motor is high up in the bell housing and may have got wet but water shouldn't hurt it really.
After the 'treatment' we drove the car for 2 hours, ample time for everything to thouroughly dry out. I also did a lot of coasting with foot on clutch to allow contact area to dry out but trust me with that amount of heat everything would have dried before the car got out of our village.

Very good points though and obvioulsy something we thought about in great detail before doing this,
the alternative however was to remove and clean the clutch and that was something I was not really wanting to do unless I had to.

 

Hey Guys doesn't everybody wash their clutch from time to time? ;-)
I believe it's in the revised Ferrari service schedule... along with the one that says the belts should be done every 3 years, ha ha.

 

Ah we are so cosey on this site, see it's not all see about cars ;-)