Brett Jenkins

As some of you may recall, I bought an 88 924s at the start of the year. Shortly there after I noticed the clutch slipping once in a while after the car had been driven a short distance. If I stepped on the accelerator, the RPM's would rise very rapidly, but the car would not accelerate accordingly. This only occurred occasionally, but I assumed it was the rubber center breaking down. So, I parked the car and drove my 944 instead. Well, I decided to drive the 924s into town to get a quote for a SS muffler. The 1st stop I came to, the clutch pedal did not return to top when I took my foot off of it. Having replaced the clutch hydraulics in my 944 this summer, I knew exactly what that meant. The did engage, so I pulled the pedal up with my toes and drove on.

The pedal was fine after that. When I got into town, I popped the hood and checked the fluid level. It was fine. I remember the PO telling me that he had the clutch and slave replaced not long ago, so I checked the records and they are brand new, hardly any milage on them at all.

One thing I noticed about this car was that the clutch pedal was very firm, much more firm than my 944 and the 944 has brand new clutch in it. Now, since the pedal stuck, it is softer and the clutch has not slipped at all since then. I have driven it exclusively for a week now and have put about 300 miles on it and there is absolutely no sign of clutch slippage, even under very hard acceleration.

Is there some possibility that something in the clutch hydraulics was causing the slippage? Seems unlikely to me, but his whole thing is odd now. Or am I just hoping for something other than needing a new clutch right now?

KuHL 951

You already know the slave or master has problems. Concerning the slippage: If the clutch replacement did not include an adjustment of the pedal freeplay you can get slippage and premature wear. Pedal freplay should always be corrected with a new clutch plate. It could be your clutch is partially engaged all the time but you should feel this in harder shifting and partial meshing of the gears at idle. Use your hand to feel if you have about an 1/8" of freeplay before you start to feel moderate resistance in the pedal. I would check that first, a bad clutch slave or master shouldn't make it slip, just harder to shift. At least the freeplay is easy to do except for the awkward position.

Steve

Brett Jenkins

The slave and master are new. I do not know if the clutch has been replaced, though. 102k on the car, so I assume it's original. My 944 didn't need one until 130k, but YMMV.

KuHL 951

Sorry I misread your post...'new clutch' on the 944 not the 924S...my bad. If the rubber centered clutch was failing like mine did it just clunks but no slipping unless it really really worn, it only can travel less than an inch radially in failure mode so you shouldn't see any increase in rpm. I would still check that freeplay though. It could be you have a rear seal leaking or antifreeze got onto the disc from a hose or heater control valve leak. All of the failed rubber center clutches I've seen had plenty of friction material left; my 83 went 160K and still gripped well even though all the rubber was gone.