Clutch pedal very hard

[Nikola]

I drive my Explorer with Mazda 5 speed manual lot of years and miles with feeling that I drive a macho vehicle, and with attitude that it has to have hard clutch pedal for a strong man left foot( and also decide to buy automatic next time, especialy in the stuck traffic). In all that time I don't understand why is has to be that hard because it is hidraulic (two time harder than my old '72 Land Rover 109 ) and also try everything with bleeding etc. with no results. Because it starting to make problem with engaging in first and reverse, I decide to change slave cylinder and clutch plate (I inspect pressure plate ,it is OK). When I do that, a FULL suprise.
Clutch pedal is become so soft and easy , that I think that it is not working at all first few time when I depressed ( I almost make a hole in the panel)
It's fuly working without any problem few weeks, and start to become harder, and harder, and harder.... and now is hard as it be before, I am a MAN again.

Can anybody explaine what has happen , and how can I get back my soft and easy ,almost femine, cluch pedal, Traffic is very stuck these days.
I already do normal bleeding procedure few times, but not the "heavy" one

 

[River]

Did you wash the pressure plate in solvent?....if so this may have lubricated the pivot points and allowed it to work more easily for a while untilt the solvent became dried. A quick try to verify this is to spray some areosol lube into the bellhousing with the engine running...try to direct it at the pressure plate and not the cuutch disk! A slight amount on the disk is ok but dont saturate it. good luck

 

[MEXEXP]

Same here...

the same has happen with my 1993 sport, and never found what was the problem.

 

[njguy_2000]

Got a '91 Navajo with the same 5spd. manual. I had a new cluch kit put in almost 2yrs ago and all was fine & dandy, but one day I noticed the pedal required more pressure than normal.. Long story short it was the Slave Cylinder. From now on whenever I do a clutch job I'm also putting in a new slave cylinder at the same time.

 

[Nikola]

for River; no ,I didn't do anything like that, just normal clutch plate and slave cylinder change. I'm also not so sure about puting lube on dry clutch assembly?
for njguy 2000: it was happen after I change slave cylinder, do you mean that the new one is not working well?
for MEXEXP: friendly soul.

I'll investigate problem , when I have some time and , or somebody who already do that and find a solution will reply to post. I'm already thinking about change master cylinder to bigger one , or to change pedal spring to weaker one.

 

[white95explorer]

A quick try to verify this is to spray some areosol lube into the bellhousing with the engine running...try to direct it at the pressure plate and not the cuutch disk! A slight amount on the disk is ok but dont saturate it. good luck

Why in the world would you do this? At best you are just gonna make the clutch slip and second you take a good chance burning that lube up on the clutch disc.

 

[njguy_2000]

Nikola - Most "clutch kits" don't include the slave cyl. only the throw out bearing, not sure if you meant that you changed the throw out bearing. But in my case I did the clutch kit with new throw out bearing and later the hard clutch turned out to be the slave cylinder. But yes it is possible that your new one is bad.