Is there a heavy duty clutch available for the Multipla ?

I had clutch problems yesterday - very notchy gear-change when driving to work, then unable to select forward gears (with engine running) when I needed to drive home.
I had a tow to the garage this morning, and the diagnosis is that the clutch has gone (not the master or slave cylinder, as I had hoped).

The clutch was replaced just over 4 years ago (about 42,000 miles ago), which doesn't seem to be a big mileage. I don't ride the clutch and I don't have a history of wearing clutches on other cars, so I put it down to the known weakness of the Multipla clutch plus the extra power from my BlueSpark CRTech1 tuning box (probably only about +10bhp, but a noticeable improvement - and declared on my insurance).

So is there an official 'heavy duty' clutch available ?

I think its more the release bearing that destroys itself as it wears a nice groove into the clutch fingers

CG Motorsports 'Fast Road' clutch kit. It's made up from standard Valeo components, but has a pressure plate with thicker, more stout 'fingers' than the one normally supplied for a 1.9 JTD. I put one on my car a few years ago; it wore out just as quickly as any other (for the reason stated by boilermansab, though I have my suspicions that's down to wear in the clutch fork and its bearings). At least it didn't slip. Last time I looked, they cost about £160.

Some pictures of the CG Motorsport clutch. I found it in a box when clearing out a dark corner of the shed. I thought I'd thrown it away long ago.





You can see that the clutch fingers are quite a lot more substantial than the standard offering. I'm not sure what car is donor for the uprated part. CG told me that they are Valeo agents and carry large stocks of individual parts, so can build a clutch to suit pretty much any application.

Looking at the clutch fingers and release bearing on it, there's very little wear and the friction plate has plenty of life left in it, so I'm not quite sure why I ran out of clutch travel and had to have it replaced. If I can figure that out, I'll be tempted to refit it when I take the engine and gearbox out, but will replace the replace the release bearing with a new one.

www.js-tuning.nl they have several clutch options for the Fiat JTD engines...


http://www.js-tuning.nl/koppeling-stage-sport-p-142.html?language=en

Thanks for the replies. (I've been away for the week, so I couldn't sit down and write a response until now. I had to drive my mother-in-law's Mazda 3, to accommodate the four of us plus m-i-l, with the Multipla out of action and only four seats in the Panda).

It sounds like the clutch fingers and/or release bearing will be what has failed, so I won't bother with an uprated clutch plate. (There was no slipping beforehand, and it failed very quickly).
Looking at BikeDoc's return spring modification, I am a little confused whether it is worthwhile. My understanding is that the hydraulics keep a light pressure on the bearing so it is always in contact with the 'fingers' (causing accelerated wear). If a return spring is added, then this is fighting against the hydraulics, so a very heavy spring would be required, and it still needs the fork to be able to back off sufficiently to pull the bearing out of contact with fingers. If the fork can back off this far, then a return spring probably isn't necessary - just to make sure that the bearing is free to easily slide away from the fingers.

Does this make sense ? I haven't seen inside a Multipla clutch housing (or changed a clutch for nearly 30 years) so forgive me if I'm talking rubbish.

I arranged for the garage to drop the box on Monday, then wait for me to have a look and decide whether I want to add any modification, but I am tempted to just tell them to go ahead and fit the standard parts.

The DMF was replaced with the clutch 42,000 miles ago, so I wouldn't expect to need to replace this again, so soon. Any thoughts ?

If it wasnt slipping, its not worn clutch plate or weak pressure plate,
I'd be tempted to change the clutch slave cylinder, and good bleed, a worn one would give you your gearchange symptoms.
Many clutches have been changed prematurely, when its been the servo clutch mechanism.

BTW, for my partners car, I changed my clutch and slave, master components this year, and while I was at it, fitted an uprated CG motorsport +25%, that I had from an old mapped multipla but never fitted.
Its performing well so far.