I have my engine out and the slave cylinder is hanging there in the engine bay. I was screwing around removing the dash and accidently hit the clutch pedal, it dropped to the floor and pushed the piston/plunger out of the slave cylinder. I cant see anything is damaged or torn, so I put the piston back in the slave cylinder, but it seems to be leaking fluid. Is there a diaphram/seal inside that was damaged when the piston shot out, or should it be ok?

Thanks.

 

I'd say if it's leaking something was either damaged or not reassembled properly. Or, perhaps, it was already leaking and you didn't notice before now...?

BB.

 

There is just a little spring type clip holding it all together. As you can see there is virtually nothing to a slave cylinder, and are very easy to rebuild. You can order the kits through napa for 20 bucks. I've had them come apart, and just put them all back together and they will work fine. You may want to spray the cylinder out with cleaner to make sure there is no crap in there.

 

Looked to me that there is the piston/plunger with a rubber gasket/seal that has a crimped on retainer, inside the cylinder housing is a coil spring, and the face has an attached diaphram type rubber dust shield/gasket. I did not see or find a spring clip/retainer?

Slave cylinder is relatively new (2 years old and just a couple thousand miles on it) and all the rubber is still fresh. No leaks prior.

I did not see anything that looks damaged, ruptured, or torn.

When re-inserting the piston, and moving it back and forth within the bore, some fluid squirted out past the piston. This is what Im concerned about. Am I missing something?

 

I would assume that made a pretty big mess that you cleaned up well enough to know if any leakage was new. If you can, I would suggest you take a good look at the bore of the slave cylinder (with a good light) and be sure it looks good. If you see any signs of corrosion, don't bother rebuilding it. New slaves are cheap and now it is easy to replace.

 

Well I knew what happened as soon as the pedal dropped to the floorboard. So I put a drip pan under the cylinder as it was leaking the fluid out - it just drained out the line from the clutch master cylinder down to the slave cylinder. The little piston was lying on the floor about a foot away.

I pushed the piston back in and pumped it in and out a few times by hand. During this, is when the fluid would squirt out the face of the cylinder right around the piston. If I remember correctly, it was on the inward stroke that the fluid came out. The piston is sitting on my work bench right now and the cylinder is still hanging from the clutch line in the empty engine bay. I will pull that off and do some checking and try re-installing the piston again.

If I have any doubt about its condition after rechecking it, I will order a new one.

Thanks for the input.