VW Mk7 & Mk7.5 Golf, GTI, GLI, Golf R, Alltrack or Sportwagen Clutch Selection Guide
We've all been there before. You've installed a few bolt-on upgrades to your car, and now you're ready to install an ECU tune to really unlock the power of your Mk7 or Mk7.5 1.8T or 2.0T. Or maybe you've already installed an ECU tune and your factory clutch is starting to slip. In either situation, you're ready to upgrade to a high quality aftermarket clutch kit to handle the increased power.
At NGP, we realize that there are lots of options out there, so we've made this guide to help you select the proper clutch upgrade that best suits your vehicle and upgrade path. At our shops, we have installed literally thousands of clutches over the past 25 years. This level of experience and expertise gives us an advantage over simple online retailers and allows us to give you advice you can trust.
Driving Applications
When choosing a clutch kit, we highly recommend thinking about what kind of driving that you'll be doing with your car. This is because different driving situations require different types of clutch components.
Daily Driver - South Bend Daily or Sachs Performance
Daily driven street vehicles will typically want a clutch that is focused on being able to slip the clutch off the line along with good longetivity. After all, you don't want to install a clutch kit that is going to need to be replaced every 20,000 miles. In our extensive experience, the South Bend Daily and Sachs Performance (not Racing) clutches do a great job of holding power under most street driven conditions. Since these utilize a fully faced clutch surface area, they can be smoothly and effortlessly slipped when taking off from a light. They also tend to last for many, many thousands of miles as long as you drive in a fairly responsible manner. Southbend's Daily lineup is a shop favorite, making up the vast majority of the aftermarket performance clutch installations that we perform in our shops.
If you go to several track days throughout the year, don't think that this clutch kit will hold you back. While it is aimed primarily at daily driven street vehicles, we have a number of customers driven vehicles as well as our own project cars that have South Bend or Sachs Performance clutches that are used on the track throughout the year. Just keep in mind that depending on how aggressively you drive on track, the lifespan of the clutch may decrease.
Track Day, Racing or Extremely Aggressive Street Driving - South Bend Endurance or Sachs Racing
The clutches in this category are designed and engineered with circuit racing in mind. As such, these clutches are focused on providing smooth and accurate shifts at high RPMs while putting as little stress on the transmission as possible. These feature a "pucked" clutch surface, which means that easily slipping them off the line isn't possible. The clutch material is typically made from high performance Kevlar, which allows the clutch to endure high RPM shifts while also being very resistant to heat. These clutches will tend to wear out faster when in a daily driven situation. Due to the faster wearing and the inability to slip them as easily, we do not recommend the use of these clutches for daily driven vehicles.
Drag Strip - South Bend Drag
The name says it all. These clutches are designed purely for drag racing, with a very fast (and abrupt) engagement. The pressure plate used with South Bend Drag clutch kits is SFI approved and Race Cover engineered to disengage with less pedal travel, which shortens the time it takes to shift. In addtion, the clutch disc utilizes a puck design, which reduces rotational mass. These clutches are also assembled with all high carbon components for maximum strength to better hold up to the brutal engagement experienced at the strip. Finally, the clutch friction material is graphite impregnated ceramic, perfectly suited for drag racing because of its maximum friction co-efficient, rapid heat dissipation and abrupt engagement characteristics. We do not recommend the use of this clutch in daily driven vehicles.
Beast Mode - South Bend Extreme
If you have a very large turbo equipped and need the ultimate in torque holding capability, look no further than the South Bend Extreme clutch kit. South Bend only offers the Extreme application in their "Stage 4" category. The South Bend Stage 4 Extreme represents the most highly engineered and over-built design available for customers looking for maximum power holding. Please note that the engagement of this clutch can be so abrupt that other surrounding components of the transmission and it's mounting will probably need to be upgraded and reinforced. We only recommend this clutch kit if you absolutely need to put down a lot of power. This clutch kit is capable of transferring at least 625 foot-pounds of torque through the transmission. We do not recommend the use of this clutch in daily driven vehicles (unless you use your clutch pedal as part of your leg day workout).
Single Mass or Dual Mass Flywheel
The South Bend and a handful of the Sachs Performance clutches that we have listed above utilize what is known as a "single mass" flywheel. This means that the flywheel is made from a single piece of billet steel.
A single mass flywheel is better from a performance perspective because it is capable of being much lighter than a dual mass flywheel. After all, less weight means that the engine is capable of spinning up much more quickly. In addition to faster acceleration, a single mass flywheel's movement is much more simple and direct; it spins at the same exact speed as the engine. As a result, the engagement of the clutch disc surface to the flywheel happens much faster and more directly.
The downsides to the single mass flywheel are noise and in some circumstances, engagement. Since the single mass flywheel is lighter, much of the engine and transmission vibration and noise are more prominent. Most of this noise (also known as chatter) is heard while at very low speeds and also while idling. However, for a majority of the stage 2 and stage 3 clutch kits from South Bend, this clutch chatter is fairly minimal and is typically not very noticeable if you have an aftermarket exhaust system. Also due to the lack of weight, the engagement can be a bit more abrupt than with a dual mass flywheel. However, this largely depends on the type of clutch you have. Most South Bend stage 2 and 3 daily kits will engage in a fashion very similar to a factory clutch with no noticeable abruptness. This is because the daily clutch discs are sprung, and designed to ease the clutch engagement.
On the other end, several of the Sachs Performance clutches listed above utilize a factory "dual mass" flywheel design. This means that the flywheel is made up of several parts, primarily divided into two main sections. One is the main clutch engagement section comprising the majority of the flywheel and the other is a "floating" mass attached to the main flywheel section. This two piece design allows the main section to rotate at the same speed as the engine, while the floating section rotates at a slightly different speed. The floating section also has several springs attached so that when the clutch is engaged, they dampen the vibrations and overall harshness.