No, he's talking about when the pedal is depressed, and the clutch disc is
not clamped.

In any case, centrifugal force is a misnomer.  It's actually inertia-or the
urge for things to keep going in the direction they are already going.  Each
bit on a clutch disc wants to keep going in a straight line from wherever it
is-which seems like a force pushing outward.

I can see how going, say, 25mph in granny gear could overspeed a clutch
disk, and cause the friction material to fly off.
Although the result is excessive slippage and chattering, not inability to
disengage (ask ME how I know).  I guess you might get chunks of friction
material caught between disc and flywheel or disc an pressure plate.  I
didn't.  My disc was already weakend by being saturated with oil.

Raymond

On 11/25/07, pdooley <psdooley@verizon.net> wrote:
>
> Correct, not from centrifugal force.
>
> Think about it- the clutch disk is "clamped" in place by the pressure
> plate.
> This greatly reduces the effect of centrifugal force.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
> Mike S
> Sent: Sunday, November 25, 2007 12:03 PM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: Re: Have you ever broken a clutch by push starting a vehicle?
>
> At 11:23 AM 11/25/2007, ***************** wrote...
> >Sorry to have to disagree,  but i've done it....
> >>If so you blew up the clutch
> >>disc from cerntrifical force... Ask me how I know this...
>
> There's the disconnect. The damage you described was caused by too much
> torque (rotational force) on the clutch friction plate. It was not from
> centrifugal or centripetal force.
>