Clutch Death -- Help! Pictures included.

ok so i was driving down 178th after work and low and behold, my clutch stays on the floor!

The pictures below show where the problem is. It seems that the fork going into the bell housing is messed. How messed, i dunno…

I have never done a clutch job before and am in desperate need of help. The car is on a cement pad beside my house, and aside from being outside, is a clean place to work. I have tools jack stands, a jack, and most likely everything that will be needed. My pops tells me I am going to have to pull the motor up to pull the bellhousing off to get at this fork thing.

Please pm me if you may be able to help in any way. If you can forward me to a reputable shop that won’t charge an insane amount, I would appreciate that as well.

I really appreciate this! :oops:

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Is the fork still firmly in its place? If so maybe your slave cylinder over extended and pooped the piston out. Or air got sucked in the line some how allowing that rod to fall out. I would recommend buying a new slave cylinder and putting it back together. bleed the clutch and see if it works. Slave’s are cheap anyways and if it works it will save you allot of time and work!! When I put my new clutch in some how air got into the system and it popped out the slave piston. I put it back in and blead the line and away it went :partyman:

Looks like your clutch fork popped out, you will have to take the transmission off. Try putting in a new slave cylinder and bleed the line just to make sure thats not the problem.

thanks for the replies guys! guess i panicked a little :slight_smile: it seems I wont have to mess with the engine at all. I now have a bit of a game plan going, so we will see what happens.

There is a lot of play with the fork as mentioned in the first picture. after work today im gunna get my stuff together and start pulling the drive shaft away from the transmission. is the slave the cylinder that pushes on the fork?

Also, if I do repair the fork and get it back into position, would you still reccomend replacing the slave and bleeding the clutch?

Ya the Slave is that nipple looking thing. My car had the same problem, and just yesterday I got my new Master and Slave cylinders replaced, and the clutch is hard as a rock now.

bleeding the clutch?

This is VERY important! Judging by all the fluid it leaked there will be air in the line. Just to be safe, When bleeding the clutch make sure to top off the resovoir every 4 pumps to make sure it dosn’t run dry and suck air.

Incase your not sure how to bleed the line follow these steps. Its very easy to do.

Make sure and buy a fair amount of clutch hydrolic fluid you don’t want to run out. When you go to the parts store for the fluid pick up some clear fuel line (I think its 1/4") get about 2’ of it. Also you will need a friend to push the clutch petal for you.

1 Fill the clutch resovor (it is located beside the master cyclandar under the hood, it is the smaller one. the lid just pops off). Make sure and keep an eye on the fluild level as you go.

2 After the car is safly supported by jack stands go under the car and locate the bleeder nipple on the slave cyclandar (the slave cyclandar is the part thats bolted to the side of the transmition, the hydrolic line runs to this. the bleed nipple is located right above were the line attaches)

3 Connect the clear tubing that you picked up from the parts store to the nipple. Take one of your empty beer cans that are now starting to pile up :tonqe: and cut it in 1/2 to make a catch can. You use this so the fluid dosen’t squirt all of you when you bleed the system, the clear line allows you to see air bubbles as they bleed out)

4 Crack the nipple lose (3/4 turn or so) and tell your friend to push the petal down. Then once he replied down, tighten the nipple. Make sure that your friend holds the petal down untill the nipple is tight, then tell him to let the petal up. once the petal is up crack the nipple lose and repeat untill all the air bubbles in the fluid have stopped, do a few extra pumps just to be safe.

5 Make sure nipple is tight and check the petal feel. if its good your all set!

dude that is awesome, thanks for the pointers! i am off to partsource right now :E

this happened ti my car aswell , but my clutch fork fell completly outta place and its hopless to try to get it in position with the trans on, hopefully i can have my car on the hoist to get it fixed

this just happened to you? man we sure SOL this weekend :stuck_out_tongue: hoist must be nice haha

the hoist would be nice , but i dunno if i will be able to use it cause its at work

ok so i got the tranny off with alot of help from my dad. i am not surprised that the fork came off cause the damn bolt/stud holding the fork on snapped in half!

more pics below. dealership parts department doesn’t open until monday so… if anyone has one of these special bolts to spare i would be extra grateful :E

it comes from the inside of the bellhousing right where the fork mounts

http://img135.imageshack.us/img135/9593/getimage2yt1.th.jpg

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to bad man, hopfully they have one in stock 8)

:o they gots to! driving an auto minivan just don’t cut it dude!

no one has a spare junk tranny laying aroung? will pay for the part if thats an issue :slight_smile:

I have one.

Name your price.

I think i have 3 or 4 actually.

OK its update time :slight_smile:

So I got a new bolt/stud pivot ball thing from the dealership and replaced that as well as the release (throw out) bearing and the main seal in the rear of the transmission. All of that went pretty easy, and when I get completely finished, I plan on posting all parts I replaced, their cost, and ,if it was difficult to do, a little how-to on how I replaced them for the n00bs like me :smiley:

I also replaced the clutch master and slave cylinders. After I replaced the slave, the clutch was still pretty limp after bleeding. I then replaced the master and bled it for about an hour. This is where the issues came in… the clutch is now even limper than it was with the old master cylinder!

The clutch will still stick to the floor if pressed :sad: and after bleeding for that hour, the pressure didn’t seem to go up much at all, if at all.

You guys ever encounter this??? I mean after a new master and slave + bleeding lots for both cylinders, shouldn’t it be hard as a rock? I must have filled the reservoir like 12 times :?

Any suggestions?

Got it beat :slight_smile:

The rod that screws into the clutch pedal from the master cylinder needed adjustment. It had to be screwed more into the master cylinder to provide more pressure. It wasnt pushing enough fluid far enough to create pressure.

Word of caution though. I adjested the rod too far into the cylinder and the master cylinder was constantly putting pressure on the fork, which puts pressure on the throw out bearing. The clutch was actually slipping because it wasnt fully engaged. This can mean bad magic if not adjusted back.

So all in all the car is on the road now, but i still have some fine adjustements to make with the rod in the master cylinder. Two turns of the rod can be the difference between riding the clutch and finding the perfect shift spot.

Will post more later! 8)

OK so before I forget. I might also recommend a sticky for this, or I could start a new “Clutch Master and Slave Cylinder Installation / Removal” thread to be stickied.

Clutch Master Cylinder Removal and Installation

Cost: ~$45 new from NAPA Auto Parts, Brake Fluid is extra

1. Inside under the dash there is a rod coming from the master cylinder that is connected to the clutch pedal by a clevis and pin setup. There is a cotter pin through the end of the pin that must be removed. Pop it out and pull the pin out. The clutch pedal should now no longer be connected to the rod on the master cylinder.

2. Next move out to the engine bay. There are 2 bolts holding the master cylinder on to the firewall from the engine bay side. The upper left most bolt can be taken off with a 3/8 drive ratchet with a ~14mm(can’t remember exact size) deep socket and an extension . It takes a little finicking around, but it can come off.

3. Bottom right most bolt takes a little more effort. Not quite sure what it is (It has liquidles hoses so I assume it has something to do with a vacuum) but there is a black unit to the right of the master cylinder that is being held down by 2 screws. Remove the screws and pull the unit out of the way as much as possible. Doing this should give access to the bottom right most bolt with a ~14mm wrench.

4. Pull the master cylinder up, but be careful not to snap the steel clutch fluid line. Find the right size wrench (12mm maybe?) and take the line off of the master cylinder. It would be a good idea to put paper towel or a rag under the unit as you remove the line as some brake fluid will leak out and, as we all know, brake fluid + paint = :o

That sums up removal. Now installation.

1. Follow above procedure in reverse.

2. When hooking up rod from master cylinder to the clutch pedal, remember to adjust it back up to the proper position. I will try to explain this as simply as possible:
a) There is a nut that is tightened up against the clevis. This nut prevents the rod from moving at all during normal vehicle use. Grab a 12mm wrench and loosen it off.
b) Now you will have to manually twist the rod to screw it either toward the master cylinder or toward the clutch pedal. It is a strange setup, but a 1/4 wrench will fit on to the rod, but only in one position. The rod looks something like the ghetto figure below:
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(__)

Where the wrench will only fit on the flat way and not the rounded way. You have to spin 90 degrees with your fingers and than another 90 degrees with the wrench (if you find it hard to twist the rod with your fingers, try pushing the rod into the master cylinder as you twist. This will help alleviate pressure pushing on the rod.). One good thing about this monkey setup is that it is easy to count the number of turns for adjusting.

As I said above, if the rod is screwed to far into the master cylinder, there will be too much pressure on the slave cylinder, which will push on the fork (release lever I think it is called. I call it fork :roll: ), which will push on the throw out bearing, which will ride the clutch. Bad stuff.

If the rod is screwed too far toward the clutch pedal, there will be to little pressure on the clutch and you may freak out like I did in one of my posts above :stuck_out_tongue: I actually thought that the master cylinder was faulty at first, and that I would have to wait a week to get another new one…

Basically to find the perfect spot, you have to adjust and road test until it feels right. One way to test for clutch slippage if the rod is too far into the cylinder is to shift into third and gun the engine. If the rpms go up like crazy with little speed increase, your clutch is probably slipping. The grab and release / engage and disengage point on the clutch pedal will also be very close to the resting point of the clutch pedal (resting point is where the pedal stays when your foot is off it). Trust me, when the pedal is like this it will feel weird and you will know. This is where you would screw the rod into the pedal and out from the master cylinder :slight_smile:

That about sums it up for the master cylinder :E Oh and don’t forget to bleed it after installation, unless you are also installing a slave. In that case, I would install the slave after the master, and then bleed the clutch. Great instructions on how to bleed the clutch were posted on the first page by JoshB.

Clutch Slave Cylinder Removal and Installation

Cost: ~$25 new From NAPA Auto Parts, Brake Fluid is extra

The slave is located on the passenger side of the transmission near the front of the tranny. It has a pin that pushes against the release lever (pictures on first page).

Removal:
1. Unbolt the unit from the transmission.

2. This is where it gets a little tricky. The part of the line that bolts into the slave is static or solid, and will not spin. If you try to twist it off you will probably twist the end off of the line, and then have to go buy a new line. No, to take the slave off, we have to spin the slave. To do this you will need a crescent wrench to fit on to the slave cylinder and a wrench (~9mm I think, maybe 10?) to fit on to the end of the line.
Hold the wrench on the line in place and twist, with the crescent wrench, the slave cylinder itself. Its not easy, (and a little liquid wrench wouldn’t hurt either!) but it is possible. Be prepared to catch some brake fluid coming out of the line.

That’s pretty much it for removal. Installation is reverse.

And there you have the clutch master and slave cylinder installation and removal in as much detail as my tiny brain could recollect. Again, after you do replace the slave, bleed the clutch as described on page 1 by JoshB.

Enjoy! :partyman:
This bad boy just barely hit 3 pages in Word :rolleyes: and all I have to say is up yours crappy chiltons manual :finga: