cliffyk

I was at a light about 2/3rd mile from my house when I stepped on the clutch, heard a snap, and suddenly gained about 2" of pedal travel--having been there and done that a few time I knew immediately a few strands of the cable had let go and it was unraveling--here's what I found:



Three or four strands were cut exactly at the entry of the 1st "hook" in my UPR triple-hook quadrant. I had been using the 2nd hook, and you can see that the cuts all happened at the same place, the entry point to that first hook:



You can see the sharp edge that did the cable in.

I blame myself for this; sort of, thought it's mostly UPR's problem. When I first installed it (70k miles ago to its credit) I had paid a great deal of attention to radiusing the top inner edges of the groove walls, however I never checked the chordal action of the cable as it passed between the hooks--that's what got me.

So this time I used a Dremel tool and a small carbide burr to radius (1/8") that nasty edge at the 1st hook's entry; and also the exit point at the 2nd hook's exit, just for good measure--no pics as I was greasy, hot, tired, and my back was killing me--this getting old stuff get's in the way at times.

I figure since it snapped close to home and got me through 3 lights and into the garage I have used up a bunch of my stash of good luck!

More good news was that I found Dorman's #16757 ($59.99 at Advance Auto is a good assembly, nearly identical to the OEM cable. Pay no attention to the photo, what you will receive is a non-adjustable cable just like the stock unit. The inner cable is the same diameter as the stock cable, and appear to be of similar layup (# of strands, and singles/strand). The sheath is a tiny bit smaller diameter than the OEM cable, 1mm or so, but it too seems to be of good quality.

It fit perfectly at the clutch lever end, and also at the firewall adjuster once I cut off all the OEM plastic stuff.

Time will tell for sure, however I am quite confident that with that sharp edge gone on the quadrant I'll be all set for some time.

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Oh, also make sure you grease everything. I put a small bit on both ends of the cable and worked it back and forth a bit; and also in the groove of the quadrant.

Hangwire

Very glad my first stang was an auto. Gave me time to learn all the tips and tricks to these manuals. Another great cliffy post with epic insight . Good thing you werent deep into the air pedal when this happened!

How much did that carbide burr run ya? I absolutely love dremel tools. I have a cordless with the huuuuge kit of bits it can solve just about any problem. I use 15 dollar drill bits at work to tap and drill heat bead blasted, heat treated stainless steel. I'll run through $45 in bits on busy days.

cliffyk

I have tons of burrs with 1/8" and 1/4" shanks that I have accumulated over the years, and 3 or 4 die grinders as well--however in these modern times I keep coming back to the cordless Dremel, it's this one:

cisurfer

Welcome to the club. Broke 5 cables even with the new Upr designed quadrant. Until I went with steeda and been fine ever since

cliffyk

Not sure I am a "club member" yet--my OEM cable lasted 70k miles with the UPR 3-hook quadrant.

I suggest you do a post-mortem and try to determine the failure mode--replacing it 5 times comes perilously close to the definition of insanity...

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edit...

I apologise for the brusque tone above--but you have piqued my curiosity, did you you change anything in between installing each of the 5 cables?

Where did they fail, in what manner did they fail?

cisurfer

no harm done cliff, youve always been a great help to me...i was just bustin and having a little fun to lighten the mood

they always tend to fail at the crimp at the end on the last hook, right where the cable meets the metal crimp...i gave my buddy my old firewall adjuster and new designed upr quadrant and sure enough 2 months later his cable broke...once i switched over to steeda i was in the clear and still have been

cliffyk

Obviously there is something about the "new" UPR quadrant that is concentrating stress, or flexing, at that point--if you have any photos of the cables and/or quadrant I'd like to see them.

I did not know they had a new design--I got mine in December of 2006 so I guess it was an original model. The point and cause of failure, and corrective action, were readily apparent as shown above.

cisurfer

dont have the cables but i still have the quadrants i will get a pic of them to you sometime today

cliffyk

Way cool, get a shot of the exit side of the hook you were using, I suspect it was sharp edged like the entry to the 1st hook on mine.

Cable is funny stuff, you can load it and bend it over radiused guides forever, but concentrate stress over a sharp edge of even softer material and it will cut like butter. In fact the easiest way to cut it is to lay it on a steel block and use a cold chisel, one sharp blow and it parts like the Red Sea...