Hydraulic throwout bearing for chevy four speed?

So, due to space issues, i need to convert my saginaw 4 speed to a hydraulic throwout bearing. No room for a clutch arm and external slave. 

Who makes the nice maintenance free robust ones that are simple to setup?

Id love to use the factory t56 stuff, as they worked for 100k without issue, but it doesn't fit over the input bearing retainer and i cant find anyone who has done it or even talked about doing it, so i assume its not practical. 

RAM is the one I've used in the past and will be purchasing for my C4 Kart project very soon.

The LS1 T56 throwout bearings (and the similar unit in 4 liter Mustang 5 speeds) eliminate the snout on the bearing retainer.  So you could, worst case, use one after going Texas Sawzall Massacre on the bearing retainer.

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

The LS1 T56 throwout bearings (and the similar unit in 4 liter Mustang 5 speeds) eliminate the snout on the bearing retainer.  So you could, worst case, use one after going Texas Sawzall Massacre on the bearing retainer.

So, lets explore sawzall massacre. Whats the downside here? Any reason not to?

Ran a 4 speed Saginaw in a 78 Malibu with a 350 sbc.

I used a a speedway throwout bearing, later replaced with a ram (because rams customer service was awesome).

Never had an issue with either one once I measured correctly.

This was in a lemons /champcar type endurance road racing build.  

Got a few trophies with that car.  Like I said, the speedway and Ram htob never let me down.

rob: so just as good as the gm version were running in the 60*v6 cars? just more finicky to setup?

Dusterbd13-michael said:

rob: so just as good as the gm version were running in the 60*v6 cars? just more finicky to setup?

I'd say slightly better.  The reason I saw that is the remote bleeder hose fittings.  On the gm (ls style) unit, they rely on a crush washer against a flattish surface to seal.  On the other models, the sealing was designed in.

One thing I will say is measure, then measure, then measure again.

I took it for granted that I had a "standard" bell housing.  I had some clutch slipping issues.  Then, I found out that my bellhousing was about 1/8 shorter than standard.  This 1/8 inch impacted the htob and it was constantly Appling slight pressure to the fingers of the pressure plate.  Just enough to cause a bit of slip and heat build up.

Another vote for Speedway. I have one of there units in the front of the RichmondGear box behind the Lexus V8 in the spitfire.

Thanks y'all! 

Looks like I will order the speedway or ram setup. 

I appreciate it!

Dusterbd13-michael said:

Thanks y'all! 

Looks like I will order the speedway or ram setup. 

I appreciate it!

Measure first.  I believe you can get different shims as part of the setup.

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

The LS1 T56 throwout bearings (and the similar unit in 4 liter Mustang 5 speeds) eliminate the snout on the bearing retainer.  So you could, worst case, use one after going Texas Sawzall Massacre on the bearing retainer.

Just did this for the racecar, but for a t5 trans. Cut the bearing sleeve off and made a spacer for an LS style HTOB to bolt to. The honda j32 pressure plate/flywheel and ranger (I think?) clutch disc made for very small window to work but it looks like it'll function. Haven't had it out on track yet.

That was just a 3d printed test adapter. Jay(Aclockworkgarage) machine'd up the real one but I don't have any pictures yet of it installed.

Just FYI, the LS1 unit is a different depth from, I would like to say LS7.    I have an LS1 unit from the time I did a single mass flywheel swap in a first gen CTS-7, the other unit was needed for the new depth.

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

Is it the LS9? I know those used an 8 bolt flywheel and dual disc clutch stock so that might be a different stack height.

We needed a longer slave because the stack height got a lot shorter with the single mass flywheel.  For some reason LS7 rings a bell, here.

I do recall that it was not a direct fit, I had to adapt the hardline to the slave cylinder to work with the CTS-V because it came out in the wrong spot.  I am pretty sure that it went up and to the passenger side so I had to lengthen it a lot, or something like that.

That car was yet another disappointment   The transmission shifted like garbage.  I've never driven a T56 that shifted well that wasn't brand new in a crate straight from Tremec, and even then they needed a shifter about twice as long as what GM used in their cars.