SpeedyC2

I was heading over to our local PCA Saturday morning gathering recently and decided the stop by a DIY car wash beforehand to hose off the track dirt accumulated at VIR the previous weekend. As I pulled into the bay, I put in the clutch to shift the car into first and switch off the ignition. As I put pressure on the clutch pedal it suddenly SNAPPED to the floor. Huh...that can't be good...

A quick investigation showed the fluid level was fine, there were no puddles under the car, and nothing appeared broken with the clutch pedal itself. When I rolled the car back out of the bay, I saw two bolts laying on the ground in a location which would have been near the front/center of the car. Huh...that can't be good...

Upon inspection and some quick research, the bolts were identical to each other and of the correct size to be the bolts used to attached the slave cylinder. Yep, they had both backed out at the same moment. (I'm sure this happened over time, but there hadn't been any indication of anything wrong up to this point.) Good thing this didn't happen going into the turn at the end of the back straight at VIR at 115 mph a few days earlier!!!

Now, I do some of my own wrenching, but in this case the master, slave, and connecting hose had been replaced by a local indy shop about a year ago. Once the issue was clear, the shop said they'd replace the slave (it was damaged) and check for any other problems at no charge. I can't complain about that!

So here's to some good luck, and to recommending everyone check their torque values!

harveyf

Mike, when that light at the car wash turned from red to green, you didn't dump the clutch at 4000 rpm and pull a hole shot? That might be part of your problem.

SpeedyC2

The thought did occur to me...

Mueller944s2

That stupid slave has caused me so many problems. The latest was also stripped bell housing threads. When threading the bolt all the way down it was stripped. So I put a few washers on the bolt, and since the washers prevented it from threading all the way down, it torqued down fine.

mel_t_vin

Unbelieveable. I suspect you would've encountered all kinds of clutch engagement/disengagement issues, well before the slave bolts freed themselves. So, over the past year, you've noticed no strange behavior from your clutch?

Again, unbelieveable. Have you actually verified those two bolts belong to your slave cylinder?

SpeedyC2

The clutch has felt great the whole time. I had the car on track two weeks ago and it performed flawlessly there.

The bolts are from the slave cylinder. How they backed out (or at least fell out) at the same time is not known. I'm hoping the threads aren't somehow stripped...