2009-15 CTS V Clutch Swap DIY: time estimate: 2-3 days for your first attempt.
Required tools:
* Assorted 3/8” and ½” metric deep well sockets, wrenches, swivels and extensions — typical fare.
* You’ll need a GM “external torx” E12 bit for the driveshaft bolts.
* You’ll need a quality 3/8” torque wrench that reads from ~20 to 75 ft-lbs, as well as a ½” drive wrench that goes up to at least 150+ ft-lb for the cradle bolts.
* Harbor Freight transmission jack or similar (if no trans jack it will be a two-man job to R&I transmission)
* 5 pound slide hammer for the pilot bearing(often available as a rental).
* MityVac hand-held vacuum pump, Dot 4 brake fluid for clutch system and lots of rags/towels.
* Lift, Quickjack or jack and jack stands to safely support the car at least 2 feet off the ground.
* Approximately 3.5 quarts of your favorite transmission fluid (GM #88861800 or Redline D4) for compete change, or at least 1 quart to top off the inevitable spill.
* Latex gloves are highly recommended due to to the inevitable fluid spills and risk of contaminating your clutch discs.
* Don’t forget paper towels, brake cleaner, red and blue Loctite, and ¼” rubber caps to plug the transmission cooler lines while you have them disconnected.
Required /recommended replacement parts:
* The clutch of your choice!
* Pilot bearing (usually included with clutch, #12557583) - $11 online
* Slave cylinder (usually included with clutch, #24281248) - $200 online
* LS Rear Main Seal (#89060436) - $18 online
* Hydraulic Clutch Main (Master) Cylinder (#24238683) - $108 online
* GM flywheel bolts (#11569956) — you’ll need eight (8) if not included with your clutch kit. Do not reuse the old bolts!
Optional replacement parts (partial disassembly of transmission required to replace seals):
* Monster billet Slave / release bearing support (replaces plastic OEM) - $80 from Monster or Tickperformance.com
* Bronze shifter bushing - $19 from www.thegearbox.org
* TR6060 input shaft / Front seal (#89059435) - $4 from www.thegearbox.org
* TR6060 output shaft / rear seal (#89059483 / TUSJ2042) - $12 from www.thegearbox.org
Relevant Torque Values:
Driveshaft (propeller) to Transmission flange bolts: 22 ft-lbs
Flywheel to crankshaft bolts: 74 ft-lbs in three passes (15, 37, 74 ft-lbs)
Pressure Plate to flywheel (may vary by clutch): 52 ft-lbs in three passes (20, 40, 52 ft-lbs)
Transmission housing to engine bolts: ~35 ft-lbs
Transmission cross member to trans & body: 44 ft-llbs
Front four engine subframe (cradle) bolts: 141 ft-lbs
Rear two subframe (cradle) bolts: 180 ft-lbs
Driveshaft to transmission flange bolts: 22 ft-lbs
Clutch assembly weights:
I previously weighed the used OEM clutch and flywheel at 65 pounds.
The new Mantic 9000 clutch and flywheel weighed in at 51 pounds.
The new Monster LT1-S and flywheel weighs 61 pounds
Day 1.
Step 1: Inspect your clutch.
Verify you have all of the required pieces, tools and fluids. Get a sharpie and mark the orientation of your clutch as you received it: best practice is to mark the orientation of the clutch pressure plate assembly, the individual spacers and any pertinent parts relative to the flywheel itself — you want to reinstall the clutch exactly as you have received it relative to the flywheel, as some clutch manufacturers balance it as an assembly. Keep mental note of the orientation of floater discs and clutch discs as they likely have a specific orientation, and may not be marked. Make sure you independently verify your own torque values versus trusting what I’ve posted here — they can vary by manufacturer and clutch type.
Step 2: Safely raise the car and support it with jack stands.
4-6 jack stands and/or a quality lift are remarkably cheap relative to your life — so don’t dick around here. I can’t imagine that being crushed by your car and slowly bleeding/suffocating to death would be any fun?
Optional: I disconnected the (-)battery terminal as I was going to be working around the starter — this is not entirely necessary but is good practice. Just make sure you leave the front driver’s window down so you can easily access the vehicle during the swap and reconnect the battery when none of the automatic locks work.
I would recommend lifting the entire car off the ground: you will appreciate the additional room while pulling the exhaust, transmission, and when disconnecting the driveshaft.
Step 3: Remove your exhaust.
Pre-soaking the bolts and Oxygen sensor bungs in WD-40 or break-free may be a good idea!
I have ARH headers, and I only removed the middle section from behind the headers up to the mufflers and had plenty of room. Depending on your brand of header, or if using factory manifolds; you may need to loosen the driver’s side header/manifold at the cylinder head enough so that it can be pushed to the side for clearance (again, I did not have to do this with ARH headers).
Step 4: Remove the shifter assembly.
From inside the car, remove the shifter boot, center console, and the shifter assembly. Now is a good time to make sure the rear parking break is NOT engaged before you disconnect the wiring harness to the e-brake, as it will make your life much easier when trying to re-align the driveshaft later.
Although not entirely inclusive, this link will give you a head start on removing the shifter in more detail:
http://www.ctsvowners.com/forum/5-t...0-hard-find-gears-having-force-into-gate.html
Step 5: Unbolt the front of the driveshaft from the rear of the transmission.
I recommend you mark the driveshaft orientation relative to the transmission before removing it. There are six bolts that use an “External Torx” E12 socket. The front half of the drive shaft will easily hang to one side — I used a bungee cord to help keep it out of the way.
Step 6: Disconnect all transmission fittings and lines.
There are ~3 sensors on each side of the transmission that you will need to disconnect and hang out of the way. Now is a good time to disconnect the slave cylinder from the master as well: remove the clip from the fittings with a small flat-head screwdriver and they will pull apart. Watch out for dripping brake fluid from this fitting. !D
You will also need to disconnect the aluminum transmission cooler lines via spring clips, one on each side, along with two 13mm bolts that secure one line to the transmission case. I capped each line with ¼” rubber caps to reduce the amount of wonderful-smelling transmission fluid seepage — then disconnect the two 8mm bolts that secure the transmission cooler lines to the edge of the oil pan: one is near the starter, the second is up front near the engine accessories. Once the lines are free, they will twist off to the side and can be secured to the subframe brace with a zip tie to reduce the risk of damaging them.
Step 7: Remove the transmission cross-member support.
There are a couple of options here, but I found it preferable to remove the two 15mm bolts that secure the rear of the transmission to the cross member (recessed in the cross member centrally), support the transmission with my transmission jack, then remove the four 15mm cross member-to-body bolts and removing the support.
The transmission jack is now mostly supporting the weight of the transmission, and I would lower the jack as much as possible, pivoting the engine down on the engine mounts.
Step 8: Remove the transmission-to-engine bell housing bolts.
Using a 13mm deep well socket and your preference of extensions, there are 8 bolts to remove: two standard bolts at the bottom by the oil pain, two extended bolts on each side of the transmission that will have various wiring harnesses clipped to them, and two standard bolts at the top of the transmission bell housing — I found it easiest to remove these first from the engine bay, then remove the rest from the bottom of the car using an 18” extension, swivel joint and ratchet.
Step 9: Lower the subframe for clearance.
I believe the easiest way to remove the transmission is to lower the subframe at the front of the car, to allow for the transmission to more easily clear the trans tunnel and firewall: I marked the larger rear most 24mm bolts with a sharpie and removed them completely — then I reinstalled them at least three full turns to establish the “maximum drop” for the subframe assembly.
I then loosened the 21mm middle subframe bolts, attempting to turn each one equally as I lowered the subframe until the aluminum braces started to rest on the rear-most bolts I previously adjusted. You will need to loosen the front two 21mm subframe bolts ½ to 1 full turn at most to allow full drop.
Step 10: Remove the transmission.
That’s it, right? Easy…. At least, that’s how the service manual puts it.
Using a large screwdriver or pry bar, start working the transmission loose via the recess by the oil pan. It will pop loose and slide back relatively easily until the upper bell housing hits the trans tunnel / fire wall — and the transmission input shaft will be about a ½” from clearing the clutch pressure plate! So close, yet so far. You can get an idea of where you’re at by feeling around in there with your fingers… giggity!
Now you’ll want to raise the REAR of the transmission as high as you can — this is where a trans jack is worth the money — and by pulling down slightly on the engine block with one hand and stabilizing the trans by the input shaft with the other, you will be able to get it clear and push it rearward enough to clear the clutch assembly.
Lower the transmission carefully, taking care to not damage the cooler lines you have zip-tied off to the side and to ensure you did not miss any harness connectors or forget to disconnect the hydraulic slave line like I did! Also remember that the shifter box and driveshaft may catch on each other so take your time. At this point, I was able to pivot the transmission around to clear the exhaust manifolds easily and the transmission was free and clear - but your mileage may vary.
Step 11: Remove the slave cylinder.
This is pretty straight forward — remove the two bolts holding the slave cylinder to the transmission and discard the old unit after ensuring your new slave looks exactly the same.
Step 12: Remove the bastard clutch that failed you.
Loosen the bolts securing the pressure plate to the flywheel — I would break a bolt free at the top but save it for last, to help support the weight of the clutch assembly why you remove the others. The OEM clutch weighs upwards of 50 pounds not including the flywheel, so be prepared to man-handle that bitch when you pull the final bolt.
Step 13: remove the old flywheel.
Use an appropriate short-well socket and long-handle breaker bar (or similar) to break these bolts free. If you’re laying under the car like I was, you’ll want to position the wrench where you can use your body weight to help pull down with one arm, using the other to keep the socket square on the bolt. You don’t want to round one of those flywheel bolts off by being hasty. If it won’t budge and doesn’t “feel” right — stop, get the propane torch and heat it up. Blasting with penetrating oil and heating in cycles will help tame even the most stubborn of bolts slathered with 5 year old Loctite — and that’s a lot better than dealing with a rounded or sheared bolt head. So if you get a stubborn bolt and that feeling that “one more try” will do it… stop, and get the torch.
Step 14: Remove the old pilot bearing.
Note that there is a freeze plug behind the pilot bearing so don’t try to use the grease / bread trick to pop it free. Rent a slide hammer from the local parts store, grind the tip of the puller as needed to fit inside the pilot bearing (I used the new one as a test piece), and then go to town. It should pop out pretty easily.
Step 15: Insert the new pilot bearing.
No grease is needed, just ensure the mounting surface of the snout is clean of debri, and using a similarly sized socket, etc… gently tap the new bearing into place. Take care to keep it square and seat it flush with the end of the crank.
Step 16: Optionally, replace the rear main seal.
I found this to be the most stressful part of my journey — you have to use a flathead screwdriver to slightly crush in the old seal at each of the three beveled reliefs of the rear of the block. If you fuck it up, you’ve made life significantly more complicated… but it took much more force than I was initially expecting: the rear main seal is a pretty stout metal ring with a rubber coating and you have to dent it in away from the aluminum rear cover to get it to slide out easier.
I would NOT recommend screwing something into the seal to pull it out as I’ve seen elsewhere — the risk of scoring the crank snout is too great. Just keep working it out with the screwdriver and perhaps some needle-point pliers.
Insert the replacement seal by ensuring it is orientated correctly (“this side out” is marked). And although there is a very expensive tool to use here, I didn’t have one so I just tapped it back in gently with a socket, working my way around several times by working it in bit by bit to keep it square and finally flush with the block.
Required tools:
* Assorted 3/8” and ½” metric deep well sockets, wrenches, swivels and extensions — typical fare.
* You’ll need a GM “external torx” E12 bit for the driveshaft bolts.
* You’ll need a quality 3/8” torque wrench that reads from ~20 to 75 ft-lbs, as well as a ½” drive wrench that goes up to at least 150+ ft-lb for the cradle bolts.
* Harbor Freight transmission jack or similar (if no trans jack it will be a two-man job to R&I transmission)
* 5 pound slide hammer for the pilot bearing(often available as a rental).
* MityVac hand-held vacuum pump, Dot 4 brake fluid for clutch system and lots of rags/towels.
* Lift, Quickjack or jack and jack stands to safely support the car at least 2 feet off the ground.
* Approximately 3.5 quarts of your favorite transmission fluid (GM #88861800 or Redline D4) for compete change, or at least 1 quart to top off the inevitable spill.
* Latex gloves are highly recommended due to to the inevitable fluid spills and risk of contaminating your clutch discs.
* Don’t forget paper towels, brake cleaner, red and blue Loctite, and ¼” rubber caps to plug the transmission cooler lines while you have them disconnected.
Required /recommended replacement parts:
* The clutch of your choice!
* Pilot bearing (usually included with clutch, #12557583) - $11 online
* Slave cylinder (usually included with clutch, #24281248) - $200 online
* LS Rear Main Seal (#89060436) - $18 online
* Hydraulic Clutch Main (Master) Cylinder (#24238683) - $108 online
* GM flywheel bolts (#11569956) — you’ll need eight (8) if not included with your clutch kit. Do not reuse the old bolts!
Optional replacement parts (partial disassembly of transmission required to replace seals):
* Monster billet Slave / release bearing support (replaces plastic OEM) - $80 from Monster or Tickperformance.com
* Bronze shifter bushing - $19 from www.thegearbox.org
* TR6060 input shaft / Front seal (#89059435) - $4 from www.thegearbox.org
* TR6060 output shaft / rear seal (#89059483 / TUSJ2042) - $12 from www.thegearbox.org
Relevant Torque Values:
Driveshaft (propeller) to Transmission flange bolts: 22 ft-lbs
Flywheel to crankshaft bolts: 74 ft-lbs in three passes (15, 37, 74 ft-lbs)
Pressure Plate to flywheel (may vary by clutch): 52 ft-lbs in three passes (20, 40, 52 ft-lbs)
Transmission housing to engine bolts: ~35 ft-lbs
Transmission cross member to trans & body: 44 ft-llbs
Front four engine subframe (cradle) bolts: 141 ft-lbs
Rear two subframe (cradle) bolts: 180 ft-lbs
Driveshaft to transmission flange bolts: 22 ft-lbs
Clutch assembly weights:
I previously weighed the used OEM clutch and flywheel at 65 pounds.
The new Mantic 9000 clutch and flywheel weighed in at 51 pounds.
The new Monster LT1-S and flywheel weighs 61 pounds
Day 1.
Step 1: Inspect your clutch.
Verify you have all of the required pieces, tools and fluids. Get a sharpie and mark the orientation of your clutch as you received it: best practice is to mark the orientation of the clutch pressure plate assembly, the individual spacers and any pertinent parts relative to the flywheel itself — you want to reinstall the clutch exactly as you have received it relative to the flywheel, as some clutch manufacturers balance it as an assembly. Keep mental note of the orientation of floater discs and clutch discs as they likely have a specific orientation, and may not be marked. Make sure you independently verify your own torque values versus trusting what I’ve posted here — they can vary by manufacturer and clutch type.
Step 2: Safely raise the car and support it with jack stands.
4-6 jack stands and/or a quality lift are remarkably cheap relative to your life — so don’t dick around here. I can’t imagine that being crushed by your car and slowly bleeding/suffocating to death would be any fun?
Optional: I disconnected the (-)battery terminal as I was going to be working around the starter — this is not entirely necessary but is good practice. Just make sure you leave the front driver’s window down so you can easily access the vehicle during the swap and reconnect the battery when none of the automatic locks work.
I would recommend lifting the entire car off the ground: you will appreciate the additional room while pulling the exhaust, transmission, and when disconnecting the driveshaft.
Step 3: Remove your exhaust.
Pre-soaking the bolts and Oxygen sensor bungs in WD-40 or break-free may be a good idea!
I have ARH headers, and I only removed the middle section from behind the headers up to the mufflers and had plenty of room. Depending on your brand of header, or if using factory manifolds; you may need to loosen the driver’s side header/manifold at the cylinder head enough so that it can be pushed to the side for clearance (again, I did not have to do this with ARH headers).
Step 4: Remove the shifter assembly.
From inside the car, remove the shifter boot, center console, and the shifter assembly. Now is a good time to make sure the rear parking break is NOT engaged before you disconnect the wiring harness to the e-brake, as it will make your life much easier when trying to re-align the driveshaft later.
Although not entirely inclusive, this link will give you a head start on removing the shifter in more detail:
http://www.ctsvowners.com/forum/5-t...0-hard-find-gears-having-force-into-gate.html
Step 5: Unbolt the front of the driveshaft from the rear of the transmission.
I recommend you mark the driveshaft orientation relative to the transmission before removing it. There are six bolts that use an “External Torx” E12 socket. The front half of the drive shaft will easily hang to one side — I used a bungee cord to help keep it out of the way.
Step 6: Disconnect all transmission fittings and lines.
There are ~3 sensors on each side of the transmission that you will need to disconnect and hang out of the way. Now is a good time to disconnect the slave cylinder from the master as well: remove the clip from the fittings with a small flat-head screwdriver and they will pull apart. Watch out for dripping brake fluid from this fitting. !D
You will also need to disconnect the aluminum transmission cooler lines via spring clips, one on each side, along with two 13mm bolts that secure one line to the transmission case. I capped each line with ¼” rubber caps to reduce the amount of wonderful-smelling transmission fluid seepage — then disconnect the two 8mm bolts that secure the transmission cooler lines to the edge of the oil pan: one is near the starter, the second is up front near the engine accessories. Once the lines are free, they will twist off to the side and can be secured to the subframe brace with a zip tie to reduce the risk of damaging them.
Step 7: Remove the transmission cross-member support.
There are a couple of options here, but I found it preferable to remove the two 15mm bolts that secure the rear of the transmission to the cross member (recessed in the cross member centrally), support the transmission with my transmission jack, then remove the four 15mm cross member-to-body bolts and removing the support.
The transmission jack is now mostly supporting the weight of the transmission, and I would lower the jack as much as possible, pivoting the engine down on the engine mounts.
Step 8: Remove the transmission-to-engine bell housing bolts.
Using a 13mm deep well socket and your preference of extensions, there are 8 bolts to remove: two standard bolts at the bottom by the oil pain, two extended bolts on each side of the transmission that will have various wiring harnesses clipped to them, and two standard bolts at the top of the transmission bell housing — I found it easiest to remove these first from the engine bay, then remove the rest from the bottom of the car using an 18” extension, swivel joint and ratchet.
Step 9: Lower the subframe for clearance.
I believe the easiest way to remove the transmission is to lower the subframe at the front of the car, to allow for the transmission to more easily clear the trans tunnel and firewall: I marked the larger rear most 24mm bolts with a sharpie and removed them completely — then I reinstalled them at least three full turns to establish the “maximum drop” for the subframe assembly.
I then loosened the 21mm middle subframe bolts, attempting to turn each one equally as I lowered the subframe until the aluminum braces started to rest on the rear-most bolts I previously adjusted. You will need to loosen the front two 21mm subframe bolts ½ to 1 full turn at most to allow full drop.
Step 10: Remove the transmission.
That’s it, right? Easy…. At least, that’s how the service manual puts it.
Using a large screwdriver or pry bar, start working the transmission loose via the recess by the oil pan. It will pop loose and slide back relatively easily until the upper bell housing hits the trans tunnel / fire wall — and the transmission input shaft will be about a ½” from clearing the clutch pressure plate! So close, yet so far. You can get an idea of where you’re at by feeling around in there with your fingers… giggity!
Now you’ll want to raise the REAR of the transmission as high as you can — this is where a trans jack is worth the money — and by pulling down slightly on the engine block with one hand and stabilizing the trans by the input shaft with the other, you will be able to get it clear and push it rearward enough to clear the clutch assembly.
Lower the transmission carefully, taking care to not damage the cooler lines you have zip-tied off to the side and to ensure you did not miss any harness connectors or forget to disconnect the hydraulic slave line like I did! Also remember that the shifter box and driveshaft may catch on each other so take your time. At this point, I was able to pivot the transmission around to clear the exhaust manifolds easily and the transmission was free and clear - but your mileage may vary.
Step 11: Remove the slave cylinder.
This is pretty straight forward — remove the two bolts holding the slave cylinder to the transmission and discard the old unit after ensuring your new slave looks exactly the same.
Step 12: Remove the bastard clutch that failed you.
Loosen the bolts securing the pressure plate to the flywheel — I would break a bolt free at the top but save it for last, to help support the weight of the clutch assembly why you remove the others. The OEM clutch weighs upwards of 50 pounds not including the flywheel, so be prepared to man-handle that bitch when you pull the final bolt.
Step 13: remove the old flywheel.
Use an appropriate short-well socket and long-handle breaker bar (or similar) to break these bolts free. If you’re laying under the car like I was, you’ll want to position the wrench where you can use your body weight to help pull down with one arm, using the other to keep the socket square on the bolt. You don’t want to round one of those flywheel bolts off by being hasty. If it won’t budge and doesn’t “feel” right — stop, get the propane torch and heat it up. Blasting with penetrating oil and heating in cycles will help tame even the most stubborn of bolts slathered with 5 year old Loctite — and that’s a lot better than dealing with a rounded or sheared bolt head. So if you get a stubborn bolt and that feeling that “one more try” will do it… stop, and get the torch.
Step 14: Remove the old pilot bearing.
Note that there is a freeze plug behind the pilot bearing so don’t try to use the grease / bread trick to pop it free. Rent a slide hammer from the local parts store, grind the tip of the puller as needed to fit inside the pilot bearing (I used the new one as a test piece), and then go to town. It should pop out pretty easily.
Step 15: Insert the new pilot bearing.
No grease is needed, just ensure the mounting surface of the snout is clean of debri, and using a similarly sized socket, etc… gently tap the new bearing into place. Take care to keep it square and seat it flush with the end of the crank.
Step 16: Optionally, replace the rear main seal.
I found this to be the most stressful part of my journey — you have to use a flathead screwdriver to slightly crush in the old seal at each of the three beveled reliefs of the rear of the block. If you fuck it up, you’ve made life significantly more complicated… but it took much more force than I was initially expecting: the rear main seal is a pretty stout metal ring with a rubber coating and you have to dent it in away from the aluminum rear cover to get it to slide out easier.
I would NOT recommend screwing something into the seal to pull it out as I’ve seen elsewhere — the risk of scoring the crank snout is too great. Just keep working it out with the screwdriver and perhaps some needle-point pliers.
Insert the replacement seal by ensuring it is orientated correctly (“this side out” is marked). And although there is a very expensive tool to use here, I didn’t have one so I just tapped it back in gently with a socket, working my way around several times by working it in bit by bit to keep it square and finally flush with the block.