Dual Mass Flywheels

[Sheds Moderator]

It seems these are fitted as a matter of routine to VW diesels and equally as a matter of routine they fail. I've had a quick Wiki and got some idea of why they may fail, does anyone have any info? Secondly, which model years of VW/Seat/Skoda diesels and models have them fitted, so I can avoid them if I see a temptingly cheap car in the local paper?

[peterg]

I think most Ford diesels have DMFs now and they fail with equal regularity too...

 

 

[Rob Morris]

Wife's DMF on her 1 owner 55 plate VW was starting to play up and then cleared itself 😬 however, my friend has just shelled out £1300 to get the one on his 57 plate Mondeo fixed which had sheared two of the fixings into the crank (Ford were not interested in helping with cost) on the basis that his car had been 10 days late for one of the services in the 60,000 miles it had covered........previously he has owned over 20 Fords and has stated this will be the last one

[Sheds Moderator]

For 1300 I would have them to Trading Stds for that. That's the kind of trick VW dealers pull for a car that's done 1000 miles over the warranty until an Appleyard Contracts purchasing manager rings up the Dealer Principal and says "Remind me, how much money do we spend with you every year? Would you like that figure to go up, stay the same, or go down? I can make it go down dramatically if you want."

[Crudders]

Well here's a subject on which I can bore for England, as any attendees of Kent meets will confirm 😳 Having had 3 of the bastard contraptions fail on a new car within 20,000 miles, you could say I'm not a fan ISTR that they became common fitment on VAG diesels from the late 90s onwards and more recently have become almost universal on all models except low capacity NA petrols. It's a 4 figure Bill at a stealer (I have heard of bills of over £2k!) but the parts are not that costly - check out buypartsby.co.uk for OE Sachs or LUK clutch and DMF kits for around £400, which could be fitted easily by an experienced spannerer like yer good self Steve.

 

I felt very slightly better about my experience when I learned of Valeo DMFs in Peugeot TDIs EXPLODING and taking out the gearbox in the process Mine *only* gave me a juddery and unpredictable clutch action.

 

Feel free to blatmail for further detail/tedium

 

Cruds

 

Edited by - Crudders on 31 May 2011 14:38:17

[The Pikey]

I had 4 new DMF's in 15000 miles and when I sold the car at 18000 miles it needed another. Car was a 2.0 TDI Audi Avant. I'm 100% sure that towing a decent size caravan/trailer can bugger these up withing one journey!

 

 

 

Jason

[michaeljclark]

Do DMF's exist inside Automatic Gear Boxes?

 

Mike

[Crudders]

Traditionally, autos have a fluid torque converter Mike. Not sure about these new dangled auto/manual hybrids like DSG, but I wouldn't have thought so. If you take a peek at a cutaway drawing of a DMF (some on Google images IIRC) you'll wonder that they last any time at all :-o

 

VAG offer solid flywheel conversion kits aimed at the minicab trade, which says it all really.

 

Cruds

[Crudders]

That should have read "new fangled", obviously 😳

 

Cruds

[Gavin H]

Is it the DMF that makes the clutch juddery?

 

I have a TDI audi with 73k miles that has had bouts of juddery clutch, all of which go after a while - first was around 20k miles, lasted a couple os weeks and was then fine. I always thought it was just after a bit of heavy clutch use and would clear with some more gentle clutch wear.

 

Maybe they are two things that exhibit similar symptoms??

[Crudders]

When mine were obviously on the way out it was gentle and mechanically sympathetic use that would bring on the judders - I had to develop a technique to load up the springs, dampers, cogs, knicker elastic, chocolate mice and whatever else they put in the hateful device, without allowing it all to recoil. Bloody ridiculous really - a flywheel and clutch should allow the driver to control how the power is fed from engine to transmission

 

Mine was a 2 litre petrol turbo BTW.

 

Cruds

[markdwhite]

All 1.9 and 2.0TDI/PDI VW have DMF I believe, same for matching Audi/Seat/Skoda and still on the latest models. I've had two complete replacements clutch/flywheel in 70,000 so far on a 2.0TDI VW Touran and are happy for the warranty to take the pain!!

 

You can get flywheel conversions kits to get rid of DMF and some have done this.

[TomB]

I had a DMF on my old 1.8T petrol A3 which lasted until about 130,000 miles then it fell apart. On the basis of others experiences, I feel quite lucky!

[Sheds Moderator]

Jesus, sounds like a world of pain. These modern TDis are great, 60 mpg is lovely but when it hands you a bill for £1500 you think of the fuel you can buy for that. As for "it exploded after 130,000 miles, I feel lucky", err, on a conventional car the clutch lasts about that long and luck doesn't enter into it.

[Graham Perry]

Quite a few manufacturers now fit them to all types of engine. Ford has had quite a bit of trouble on some of their cars but reading the Ford Forums its now much better than it was a few years ago, so maybe they have found a fix ? Do VW's still fail with the same regularity as they always did or have they improved as well ?

[ParsleyTheLion]

DMFs are ubiquitous these days. The flywheel manufacturers and car companies have all learnt a great deal in the last decade, and they are nothing like the problem they used to be. Many have features like torque limiters, better damping materials, multi-rate springs, better end stop features etc. that makes them quite robust. The engine control systems are also much more capable at protecting the DMF from the most stressful manoeuvres. You can do also your bit by treating your car with a bit of care (e.g. try not to stall, don't let the engine bog down on pull-away). Don't worry about them if you've got a new car .

[markdwhite]

I originally found it very easy to stall my 2.0 16v TDI VW and it makes a horrible bang when it does!

 

Most TDI VWs have launch control , in first gear with the clutch down, you can floor the throttle and the ecu rev limits to ~3000rpm, slip your foot sideways and release the clutch. Being a diesel it moves forward pretty rapidly but, sadly only 30' and you have to grab 2nd just before the limiter kicks in. For anyone behind, the quick (and smooth due to DMF) take off is masked from view, all they see is a cloud of smoke, sadly not from the tyres, but the funnel!