MikeZ

Well two days ago... I was driving the Z home, and right before I got there I noticed that it was pretty hard to pull out of gear(4th on a main road) to go around a corner. It CLUNKED out when it did get out of gear. Then when I had to accelerate from coasting(out of nuetral, because I was freaked out about the previous noise) it was damn hard to put it into 2nd. Although it did grab hard like usual.
And then pulling it out of gear when I got home was crap, yet again.
Like an idiot, I just thought it would go away over night. But it didn't.
I got in the car again and started her up, it had a weird high pitched whine now. Then I couldn't push the car into gear. It would just grind if i pushed with the clutch all the way down.
So I tried a new tactic, I turned the car off, put the car in first. It yanked like I stalled it, but it allowed me to putter around the neighborhood, then again it wasn't allowing me to shift, so i parked the ol' girl. and the whine went away???!! I dunno.

I believe it to be the slave-cylinder. Not the actual the actual mechanical clutch assembly, because it does hold itself in gear, just doesn't let anything in or out.

I haven't noticed anything like this before, ever. It only gave a moments warning.

MikeZ

and the clutch is alot heavier. What the hell?

Goofyz

and just look at the slave cylinder movement, have you checked the clutch fluid level? Sounds like one of the following happend.

1. your Master cylinder blew the seals meaning you can't create a difference of pressure, e.g. slave cylinder movement.


2. your Slave cylinder blew out (typically happens at the boot) and you lost all your fluid.


3. one of your clutch lines blew or you got a slow leak that lets air in and now you have a bubble.


4. the vacuum line on your booster or one of those 1 way valves went **** up.<-- that means broken.


Its pretty easy to figure out what happend if you still have fluid left in the resivoir. its most likely 1 or 4, if you are very low or have no fluid its 2 or 3. If the pedal feels pretty much the same as before it stopped working its most likely 1.

I sincerely doubt its your clutch cause you said you can still putter around the hood and it lurched in first gear when you started it. This means the pressure-plate and flywheel are making good pressure on the clutchplate. So mechanically power is getting through the system. If your clutch was fried power wouldn't get throught the system. if you can't visualize this, try this link. http://auto.howstuffworks.com/clutch.htm. Good luck.

b300z

most likely one of those.

this is very very unlikely, but it may be something in your clutch petal/engagement as well.
theres a writeup in rizz'z link page on how to adjust it if you ever need to.

MikeZ

I know how clutches work, but thanks anyways. And I did say that i knew it wasn't the mechanical part of the clutch.
However I did look at the clutch fluid level, and its at max.
The master cylinder moves when the clutch is depressed, so if that helps.
The pedal pressure has increased significantly and is rough.
No i haven't gotten under it yet( need my friends jacks).

Thanks dudes

snwbrderphat540

idk could be throw out bearing it was whining wasnt it?

MikeZ

yeah it did for around a minute and then it stopped making the whine.

Goofyz

If you have a Habor Freight tools nearby you can get thier "cheaper" all aluminum floor jack for about 70$ and it is INVALUABLE for getting the front of your car up quickly and safely. Sounds like you really wont know what the problem is until you get it up in the air. Throw bearings usually make a persistant noise when they go bad before they cease and make a horrible noise and or disinegrate and make no more noise.

If your pedal feels heavier and perhaps a bit more clunky (is this a TT?) could be a finger or tine on the pressure plate, perhaps two

MikeZ

No, it's a 95' NA. And it hadn't been making a noise before this happened.
And wouldn't having a finger/tine touching the clutch plate mean that the clutch would be able to open and close?
For all i cant tell, it will not go into or out of gear when it is on, but when it is off it will allow engagement of the gears.

Riz Z Speed

yup, clutch line.
the new hardness of the pedal should tell you that the clutch master cylinder is still making pressure but it's not going anywhere. Sounds like the slave isn't moving or something is preventing the fork from working properly and/or there's air in the system.
if the clutch master cylinder wasn't holding pressure, the pedal would sink to the floor and not recover.
if it was mechanical as in bare pressure plate, the trans would shift into and out of every gear w/o engaging regardless of clutch pedal position.
my bet is the slave cylinder since there doesn't seem to be any leaks.

MikeZ

so to recap, slave cylinder is broken? as well as the clutch lines?

Is the something I could do myself on jackstands? Would I need to bleed the clutch fluid? And how much would i expect this to cost if i have NIssan take care of it?

snwbrderphat540

if its a line or a slave do it yourself,, they are easy as pie, but thats only if you know thats the problem no point in replacing somethign on a guess. slave cylinder is a couple bolts to remove from tranny (assuming its very similare as the early Z's cuase i never had to do anythign with this on my Z32) and tehn one nut shaped fitting to remove the slave from teh line and put the new one on and bleed it. and bleeding stuff is easy as pie if you dont know how to do it now is the time to learn. very good stuff to know. could also be teh line which is only ONE line and most likely a hard line for most of the way so its hard for it to leak maybe a fitting though, but if you cant find any fluid in the engine bay or on the ground where its parked it probably isnt a leak and is just a slave cylinder failure.

MikeZ

so, how can i visually see if the slave cylinder doesn't work? Can I?
Do I have to take it off to inspect?

Annnnd the car has it's fluids at max, and isn't leaking at all, so I think I'm just going to put an order in for the slave cylinder now...
Is there anything else I need besides the cylinder? Will I need to replace any gaskets, or can I use the old ones?

Goofyz

all you need is a friend to push down on the clutch pedal from inside the car while you lay under it and look at the slave cylinder for movement. This should work with the engine off, no need to turn on cuase NA cars don't use vacuum assist for clutch. It should move the lever its pressing against about 1.5-2 inches. But for your own safty, wear eye protection, cause if brake fluid shoots out you don't want any in your eyes, that stuff is nasty.

MikeZ

thanks, I'm going to do it( the check) in a couple hours.

I would totally be in the dark without you guys.
thanks for all the VERY good info!

Tell you how it goes tonight!

MikeZ

So i got the car up on the stands and watched the cylinder as my friend stepped on the clutch a few times...
And it moved the way it should...
So now what?(I'm retarded)

If it moves like it always has, what does that mean? It's has always squeeked when I depressd the clutch.
Aaaaaaaaaah!!! I think I mighte have to tow it!

snwbrderphat540

my pedal squeeked to, ummm..... if its moving the way it should then it could be in teh clutch assembly like some suggestions. your sure it moved perfectly?

MikeZ

well it seems to move around an inch or so...

snwbrderphat540

hmm, you just guestimated? didnt actually measure? as a recap, when you push teh clutch pedal it still has teh normal amount of pressure or at least not less, but its acts as if you never pushed teh pedal down at all right?

entropy31

my clutch pedal squeaks sometimes too. must be a z32 thing.

MikeZ

Yes, snow. Exactly the way it behaves.

snwbrderphat540

interesting, just clarifying that because there were so many posts with additional symptoms lol.... thats a bummer, well i would still think slave but you seem to think not, i doubt it could be master becuase when that fails the pedal sinks to the floor and has no pressure, it could be air in teh line, but you would need a leak for that to happen, and tehn there should be fluid on teh ground somewhere, why dont you try bleeding it and see if that fixes it, its cheap and easy and fast. better than pulling crap apart before starting with the easy stuff.

MikeZ

Well, I'm going to have my friend's dad look at it, he's cheap and won't rip me off either way. Thanks dudes!

MikeZ

So I finally towed my car to a shop. And they said that they would take the tranny out and look at the clutch. They told me that they weren't really sure what the problem is( i doubt they looked very hard), so they decided to take my car apart.
They didn't bleed it of course...

MikeZ

So do the Southbend DXD clutchs look alright?

http://www.conceptzperformance.com/C...3468.254.42.18