Clutch Problems on '94 Sport

[MythX]

I'll apologize in advance for this lengthy story, but it might shed some light on what's going on.

Just under a year ago, I had my trans rebuilt (It's a 5-speed for the '94 sport). Apparently, these are good transmissions, but there are 3 rubber seals in the top that wear out, fall out, then allow the fluid to leak out and/or become contaminated. The place I chose is reputable, I received several recommendations to use them, and they were priced fairly. Just under $2000 got my trans rebuilt, new clutch, new slave cylinder.

No problems until earlier this month when my clutch went out (obvious hydraulic issue since pumping helped me limp it on into the shop). Initially the guy said he couldn't find a problem and told me he bled the system and to bring it back if the problem returned. It worked for the morning, but by the end of the day the problem had returned. They looked at it the next day and told me it was the master cylinder. Not a big deal, $250 would solve that problem.

Got it back and everything was fine. For a couple days. Then it started to be difficult to shift, I couldn't get it into reverse with the engine running. The next morning I went to take it back to the shop and it worked fine, shifted easily, even reverse. Had them look at it, they re-bled the line and gave it back. Worked find after that (they had obviously adjusted the clutch such that I had to let it out 50% before it would make contact). This was Thursday last week. I used it over the weekend and the clutch was slowly adjusting back to a normal contact point, and this morning by the time I got to work it was getting difficult to shift again.

I haven't contacted the shop, I wanted to get some information from the group about what this might be first. There's also a couple other things I noticed that may or may not be related.

First, my truck has always made a clunk sound when releasing the clutch when shifting into 5th. (before and after the trans rebuild this existed). This suddenly stopped after the latest visit to the shop, not after the master cylinder replacement, but after the re-bleeding afterward.

Recently (couple months ago) I started getting a low idle in my truck (about 500rpm). I haven't done anything about it, but it only required me to give it some gas while waiting at a light. That went away as well.

My question, is could these things be related? Is the clutch system connected to any of the vacuum lines? Maybe they just plugged something back in. What could cause such inconsistent behavior with my clutch? Could this be an issue with the parts of the clutch inside the trans, and the shop is just trying to avoid a warranty repair? Warranty on the rebuild is good till mid-January.

Thanks in advance

 

[Jason94sport]

new slave cylinder.

Was it a Ford unit? It's common to have aftermarket ones fail early after replacement.

 

[MythX]

That's a good question, I didn't ask what parts they used, the paperwork didn't specify a brand on the slave.

Would that explain why the behavior is inconsistent? Why it gets better, then worse, then better again?

 

[jd4242]

That's a good question, I didn't ask what parts they used, the paperwork didn't specify a brand on the slave.

Would that explain why the behavior is inconsistent? Why it gets better, then worse, then better again?

That sounds like air in the system. Its very hard to bleed right.I would try and rebleed it first .I seen a pretty easy good way to bleed it tho.

 

[jd4242]

Also may wanna check and see if they used atf not gear lube

 

[MythX]

Good point, though I'd hope the trans shop would know better.

Thanks

 

[jd4242]

You would hope so but I've told people before that it uses atf in my 5speed and they looked at me like I was crazy..

 

[MythX]

Well, it seems odd to me too, but it's in the specs.

I wouldn't think the wrong oil would cause problems with the clutch though, maybe the shifting, but there's a definite issue with the clutch.

Thanks

 

[jd4242]

Well, it seems odd to me too, but it's in the specs.

I wouldn't think the wrong oil would cause problems with the clutch though, maybe the shifting, but there's a definite issue with the clutch.

Thanks

Yea that's what I'm saying, clutch may have air in it and trans may have wrong fluid making hard to shift some times..

 

[MythX]

Well, didn't get to try and look at it last night. Might have to wait till the weekend. Ran fine this morning, no issues at all. Shifting was a bit difficult last night, but probably wouldn't have noticed if I weren't looking for problems.

What's the easiest way to find out what kind of oil is inside? They don't seem to make the fluid easy to get to on this one. I'm figuring I'll need to pickup a pump. Gear oil is going to be brown/black, whereas ATF will be red right?

Thanks

 

[FR-425]

You may have one or two broken fingers on the pressure plate as well.

This will cause varying contact points through temp changes, and it will be "grabby" at times.

The reason for ATF is the friction material on the syncro's.

Gear oil trany,s just have bronze-on-steel syncro's. noisy, not smooth, heavy, expensive, better yata, yata

 

[malohnes]

Yes MythX, you have it about right on checking the fluid. I'd pull the fill plug and check there. This way too, you'd be double checking the fluid level, not just the type of fluid.