Jay Wellwood

On my way to pick up the Police Report from having been rear-ended in my Dodge Ram this last Friday Night....in the 'new-to-me' 968 - goto downshift going around a corner and oops...no pedal, and no damn clutch either!!!

Coasted to a stop in the Building Inspector's Office and called for the flatbed. Wait about 15 minutes and here we go. Guy has never seen a 968 (go figure) and I start looking for the tow hook to get the car up on the flat bed - only to discover that this is the ONE G..D.. piece of the tool kit not in there... Get in touch with the wife - bring the one from the 928 - it (hopefully.... ) will fit tghe 968. Sure enough, after much ado - the tow hook arrives and we are on our way back to the house. The rest of the return was un-eventful fortunately.

Well...it would appear that the completion of the conversion to the Turbo S is about to commence AHEAD of schedule in that there is no sense in replacing the clutch now only to have to change it later this year (hmmmm...spending $$$ to save $$$ - gotta mention this to my wife later... )

Thanks for the vent..

Damian in NJ

Are you suggesting I should lunch my motor and then tell wifey 'better go with the 25K Powerhaus 450hp conversion, gonna need the motor rebuilt anyway'?

RajDatta

Jay, I would investigate it further 1st. It could just be a blown line as well. Usually clutches don't just drop like that, sounds hydraulic to me.
Raj

Jay Wellwood

Nooooo...not unless you think that

1) She'll buy your argument,

and

2) You can afford it

Jay Wellwood

Thanks for the input Raj...Trevor just contacted me as well with the same suggestion.

I'll look into it Tuesday evening. First 5/6 speed I've ever owned - guess I need to look into the archives on the in & outs of the mechanicals.

Thanks for keeping me honest as well as back on task.

RajDatta

Give me a call tomorrow if you need help. I should be able to figure his setup out. From the way I would see it, he has everything the same except the 951 trans, shift rod and shifter possibly. I would 1st check the line from the clutch master to the slave cylinder. They tend to bind to exhaust or other hot engine parts and melt over time. Next would be the slave or the master cylinder. See if you even have fluid.
You gotta get yourself a 6 speed eventually to harness all that power.
Speak to you soon.
Raj

BruceWard

Jay,

I went through this (well actually a disk failure) earlier this year. Let me know if I can help!

If you end up replacing the clutch I have the perfect set of cheeseheads and a long ratchet. With your lift this should be pretty easy!

BruceWard

Bye the way do you have a 951 or 968 bell housing?

I have a motive power bleeder for changing the fluid when it turns out to be hydraullic!

Jay Wellwood

Thanks guys...
Raj - just as you suspect the setup is.
Bruce - I may take you up on that power bleeder, and I have the original 968 bell housing.

I'll let you guys know what I find...

flash968

ok, here's a question - we know we're supposed to change the fluid regularly, and we know a lot of prople don't - has anybody done any database stuff to see who has had hydraulic failure and who hasn't and what shcedule of fluid change there has been? it seems there have been an awful lot of hydraulic failures lately and i am wondering if it's due to failure to change the fluid enough, or time itself, or mileage

BruceWard

Flash, most of our cars have 10 year old rubber and hoses driving our clutches. If the failure was due to old fluid then mine should have failed long ago. At some point the fluid in my car got so old that the calipers were full of a crystaline substance that once had been brake fluid.

The most common problem seems to be hoses.

Jay this is another owners experience

"My clutch pedal slammed to the floor--luckily while in my driveway about to leave for class. I replaced the slave cylinder and then the master cylinder before realizing it was actually the hose between them that had developed a microscopic leak ... the "driveway-mechanic, trial and error, replace-everything-until-it-works, diagnostic method" at its best! That said, it certainly doesn't hurt to have it all new, and like Bob says, ready for another decade. That's what I told myself anyway! It's only money, right?!"

I am hoping that this is may be the solution to your problem.

If it is mechanical like mine was the 968 bell housing is going to make it much easier

flash968

well, that's another thing - you're supposed to change your hoses every couple of years too - this is my point - has anybody done any spreadsheet kind of thing to see the correlation between the parts being ignored and failure?

BruceWard

I may be unqualified to question your decades of experience but if you read the service manual you will find that changing or even inspecting the clutch hoses is not a service item. The only relevant service item is "Visual inspection for leaks: Oils and fluids".

I am not aware of any master, slave or hose failures which were preceded by leaking or any other visual indication of impending failure.

flash968

without getting into any more digs and jabs and staying focused on the issue at hand, this is a long known "common knowlege" kind of thing amongst mechanics - i would be extremely surprised if you were to query a dealership and their inspection manual and find that those hoses are not inspection and scheduled replacement items - there has been discussion on this on 968.net and others have said the same thng i am saying

a visual inspection for cracks and leaks is only part of the preventative maintenence though - hoses swell on the inside over time - that is why they are supposed to be changed regularly - fluid gets contaminated by water condensation - that is why it is supposed to get changed regularly - from mechanics over the years, and other car manufacturer's shop manuals, the rule of thumb for hoses is no more than 5 years and should be done at 3 - fluid every other year

i just read an article, when i was poking around about brake bias valves, on the hose issue and will go back and find it - it had pictures of hoses that had been ignored - they were swollen almost shut - this is a very frequently ignored item and many people just don't know any better

i became keenly aware of this issue years ago when dealing with live rubber seals on british cars - many brands of brake fluid would swell and shrink the seals and then they would fail - this led to looking into failure causes of hydraulics in general and what to do about preventing them

i guess the answer then is no, nobody has done any correlation work regarding failure to maintain hydraulics and failure rates of those components on these cars

flash968

by the way - i found in the maintenence manual that came with the car, a requirement for a visual inspection of the brake hoses for "clearance, damage and corrosion" every 15000 miles - i also found a requirement for fluid change of the brake system every 3 years