Orientation of clutch fork rubber boot

[18Fiatsandcounting]

As mentioned by RRoller123 and Spider951 on another thread, the correct orientation of the rubber boot that goes around the clutch fork as it goes into the bellhousing and acts as a dust shield is apparently not intuitive. So I thought I'd make it another thread, and here we are. Enjoy.

I've looked through my Haynes, Clymer, Chilton, and factory service manuals for the 124, and it appears that RRoller is correct: The main (protruding) part of this rubber boot should "point" inside the bellhousing. All of these manuals show it this way, and I don't know how I missed it for all these years (yes, yes, "cluelessness" I hear you say, and you might be right).

Fortunately, this is easy to fix. I had a new rubber boot, so I jacked up my '71 spider, marked the positions of the large nut and locknut on the clutch cable, removed these two nuts, removed the old torn boot, put in the new one in the right orientation, tightened the two nuts back to where they were, and lowered that bad boy back off the jack stands. Total time: 30 minutes. Have mercy, Miss Percy!

-Bryan

[RRoller123]

It is not intuitive! In fact the reverse seems right. If the orientation of the "U" slit had not changed, flipped 180 deg somewhere along the line, Tim and I would never have noticed the difference. Tim is actually the one who got this right, I started to put it on the intuitive, wrong way, and then we noticed that the slit had flipped, and all hell breaks loose. Decades of tradition out the window, just like that! LOL.

[18Fiatsandcounting]

I wonder if, in addition to the change in orientation of the U-shaped slit, the "innie" or "outie" nature of the boot changed over the model years. Maybe early cars started out with the boot protrusion sticking out of the bellhousing, and as time went on, Fiat found that it worked better with the boot protrusion facing inward, and so that's what they did and that's what ended up in the shop manuals.

The reason I ask this is that while I have no evidence (photos) exactly how the boots were originally oriented on my '69 and '71, I think I would have noticed this difference. The '69 has been in the family my entire life, and the '71 was bought back around 1987 with no evidence that the boot had ever been replaced by the previous owner. Both boots have always faced out with no ill effect as far as I can tell.

One of those weird Fiat quirks, perhaps.

-Bryan

[Spider951]

I can't speak to the dust boot orientation for pre-'81 spiders, but for mine ('81) the orientation was "innie" (OE). The photo below shows the position of the boot (to the right of the splined shaft in the pic) when I replaced the clutch, etc. (I only wish that I had remembered that I had that photo before banging my head against the wall trying to make the boot fit the wrong way for several hours....it's what happens when you wait months between removal and re-install...doh!).

[tima01864]

If you have it out the out will just push the spring off the lever and pull the lever off the ball, all sorts of argedda. Just looked at my 71 transmission, Yes the boot is in, Looks original and in nice shape.

[18Fiatsandcounting]

I think we can safely conclude at this point that the boot should face inward as shown in the picture, and that I've had it wrong all these years. Never had a problem with either car, but I did correct it yesterday on my '71 spider (easy job as I mentioned), and I'll correct it on my '69 next time I'm under there.

Thanks guys.

-Bryan