Shoe

First I have to say that waiting for that 500 miles till the clutch breaks in takes a lot of patience. I got the Spec stage 3 clutch and LW flywheel. Here is a run-down.

Performance:
I could already tell just by light driving around town that the LW flywheel was making a difference without even WOT. The turbo spooled up much faster than before. Last night while driving home from my fiancée's house I finally hit the 500-mile mark so I decided to have some fun. In the first 2 gears the difference was very noticeable. It spooled up very quickly. Usually when I'm at 2500rpm or so and I WOT there is a momentary pause before the car takes off, it feels like the car has to pass over a hump before the power comes on, now the response is much better, it feels like the car lost a few hundred pounds when I'm in the lower rpms. When I took off from a rolling start, I was caught a little off-guard because it revved up so fast. In the higher gears, the flywheel benefits are less noticeable. Matching revs is fun now, the engine revs much more freely.

Ease of derivability:
I came from a WOA stage 2+ clutch (worn out in 15,000 miles) and I don't know whether it's the SPEC clutch or flywheel but it grabs quickly and if you don't know to massage the clutch when starting you may stall. I haven't stalled yet but the engine almost died on me a few times. One of the first things I noticed is that the rpms drop like a rock between shifts; you gotta be quicker. The clutch feels very on/off, some people say give it another 500 miles and it gets better. The first 150 miles I had to be careful starting from a standstill, I had to make sure I revved enough to keep the engine alive. After a 150 miles of breaking in, it got much easier to drive (or maybe I got use to it). Now its very livable for a daily driver, I do a lot city driving and it's tolerable for me. During idle there is now a rattling noise from the engine, I think people call it `chatter'. It doesn't bother me but it doesn't sound that great. I also have this rattling noise when the engine is cold when driving. It goes away after a while, this I'm not sure if it's from the flywheel or just something loose in my engine. Also, sometimes I find that the engine is more resistant while lugging at low rpms (1000-2000rpm) in a higher gear. This happens when I'm going over a speed bump and I don't want to shift to first, the chatter is apparent when you start to accelerate out of the bump in second. I haven't tried any launches yet; I want to get a little more use to first.

Concl:
I'm glad I did it, the benefits out-weigh the issues. It's not for everybody but for the enthusiast it's great. I wanted to go through the exp. of a lightened flywheel because I will probably never do it again.

BLKPERL

Is it hard to get moving in 1st? Do the RPMs fall really fast that you have to catch it with some gas?

Shep 1.8T

I think he means, because this is his last performance car

BOOSTD

You also don't have to give it gas to keep it running or anything like that.

IMHO the RPMs don't fall fast enough.

Greyhound Guy

I had the same breakin/getting use to on a stock clutch replacement. Its just the way it is.

Shoe

Yeah this is the last time I have a car this modified. My next car is going to be stock, I've been driving modified cars for 10 years now and I'm looking for a more luxury/sports car for my next one. I am toying around with the idea of getting a second car in a year and buying a truck as my daily driver. The C6 Zo6 vette is catching my eye. Even in stock form that thing is going to be a freakin beast. I can't imagine what 500hp in a 3000 lbs feels like.
It's not that had to get moving in first but it is harder. In stock form, I could bring it to 1000rpms and get a nice and smooth launch. Now you can't get a liquid smooth launch anymore and to get a fairly smooth one it's easier to rev to 1500 to start(expected from a flywheel that is 1/2 the weight). With my buddies it's cool, we don't care for comforts but when I'm out with my gf I wish the engagement could be smoother.

Ray Khan

break in on mine was scary. I though I made a big mistake getting a stage 3 clutch. After about 2000 miles, it's so much smoother.

bsewall

I had a SACHS Stage II clutch in mine and it chattered like a b*tch, so I just put an OEM clutch in.

The ONE THING I hate about this car is the revs - it's not at all responsive and they don't drop at all between gears. Rev-matching when downshifting is not easy when the flywheel just spins away.

How easy is it to just replace the FW? I heard you don't have to do nearly as much work as replacing the whole clutch assembly.

Cleared Hot

And also work well with a stage 3 (eventually).

BLKPERL

The sound Shoe is talking about comes by having a LW Flywheel