Clutch gremlins.

[Whitehatchwonders13]

So last night as I was driving home I went to downshift and my pedal went all the way to the floor and I had to lift it back up and from then my clutch engagement was super low, still shifted fine. Today I threw in a spare slave cylinder, bled it, and adjusted the clutch. Now my clutch pedal feels stiffer than what I'm used to, any idea as to what could be causing this? Clutch/pressure plate/ and flywheel are all new (white bunny package) Nissan oem throw out bearing and pivot ball, NAPA master cylinder and advanced auto slave cylinder at the moment.

[centralcoaster33]

Pedal resistance comes from the pressure plate installed. I had bad luck with a master cylinder replacement I bought once. I was just trying to replace all the bits, so my stock one was fine and I ended up putting that back in. The piston on my replacement part was too short to reach my pedal. Now I am wary of non-oem replacement parts.

Another time, I had a clutch failure. Something got stuck behind the tines of the pressure plate and prevented me from pushing in the pedal. I doubt you have that issue, but it's not impossible.

Is there anything about your pedal itself that could have become bound up? Maybe the master cylinder screws are c***-eyed in the firewall so something is rubbing?

If it is all shifting fine and working fine, you may just have a new clutch feel to get used to. That can happen if you replace your clutch with a different type. I'm not familiar with the white bunny setup. I read one review on Enjuku where they said it had the same feel as stock, so I'm stumped there. I would guess a 'competition' clutch would have a stiffer pressure plate.

At least you made it home safely. When mine was stuck behind the tines, I had no clutch. I banged gears all the way home, running red lights and stop signs for some 50 miles. Very stressful!

[Whitehatchwonders13]

Well I've had the clutch on there for about 15k miles. During the break in period I snapped the pivot ball and lost the clutch so I had to drop the transmission again and that's when I installed a Nissan pivot ball and throw out bearing. After that it was fine and I got used to the clutch feel but now it's stiffer than what I'm used to. As far as pedal assembly goes it looks decent under there aside from the white lithium grease i sprayed on it because it was squeaking a bit. Oh forget that! 50 miles without a clutch??

[centralcoaster33]

Okay, I'm glad yours is working fine. How did you break a pivot? That seems hard to do.

Haha, yeah 50 miles! It was maybe 2 a.m. after a long drive. I heard a 'tink' sound from the clutch while coming home on 101 in CA. So, I went to take the first exit in Soledad because it has a gas station next to it. Well, I couldn't get the car out of gear with the clutch. So I had to just pop it out and coasted to the stop sign and shoulder. I couldn't see anything wrong with the clutch from the outside, so I went into the gas station to borrow a screwdriver or something. Well, that was worthless, nothing to unscrew down there. I fussed with the pedal for a while, stared at the slave cylinder, had a couple of smokes and decided I needed to get home. No AAA at that time and no $ for a tow. I started it up, buzzed first gear a couple times and realized I can't put it into first with the car idling. So, I killed it, put it in first and ran the starter. Of course, being in gear, the starter motor was actually driving the car (thank God I had a good battery and starter!) and once I was going maybe 2 or more miles an hour it fired, squealed, burnt a little rubber and right back onto the freeway I went! Rev matched all along 101, then Spreckles, then 68, then 1, then 68, then Forest, then David, then my street in Pacific Grove. That route only had like 3 red lights and maybe two stop signs. For a "stop" I'd get down to first, nearly bogging, make sure there were no cars coming, then run through them. Luckily there was no traffic and no police. I was kind of sweating a bit and had chain smoked a whole pack in that distance.

What was it? Well, one of those springs in the clutch disc had popped out and lodged itself between the pressure plate and the tines that move it. Then I remembered, nearly a 6 months ago, I had put in a clutch with my friends help. When he was stabbing my transmission back in (and here I thought I was being a clever Tom Sawyer in having my strong friend do the muscle work for me) he dropped it a little and it hit a tine pretty hard, which cracked the center of the clutch, which eventually let the spring pop out.

The lesson learned? Don't trust free labor? Clutches are overrated? No. But I did learn that you can drive your car around by just the starter motor!

[Whitehatchwonders13]

I guess an upgraded clutch on a 22 year old pivot ball took its toll lol happened right after I got my sr in i was bummed out. But holy crap dude that sounds like it was quite the fiasco! Welp now I know I can drive my car with my starter haha. But I figured it out though. Although I killed a fresh slave from NAPA in the process. I'm pretty sure my clutch fork is slightly bent because I out the new slave in and was bleeding it when the whole piston came out along with the pin and i guess the rubber cup tore in the process so I'm going to return that one. Turns out the first slave was still good believe it or not so what I did was put an extra socket at the end of the pin to extend it and now my clutch feels how it should. The only thing is how long will this last? Clutch isn't slipping or anything and it fully engages and disengages so that's good. I just feel as if this is more of a bandaid than a repair lol.

[centralcoaster33]

Uh, I'd get a new fork in there. It's amazing what work around's can do in the short term, but I'd think you need something pretty reliable down there. You're not in CA are you? I have two or three of these forks near my work bench as I type. All, extras. They seem pretty hard to bend, but you managed to break a pivot ball, so some force was definitely applied at some point. That could be why the pin is short. Though, if you had bled it without the socket extension, maybe it would have fit. Was it not making contact?

[Whitehatchwonders13]

Yeah I'm gonna need to get one in there I don't like knowing that I have it rigged. Nahh unfortunately I'm in Florida at the moment. It was making contact with the new slave but I guess when I had the pedal all the way down it overextended the pin and just pushed the piston out entirely, and then when it came back in slightly it took a chunk off the rubber cup that's behind the piston so I gotta return that now. Clutch feels great now though.