SARGEPUG

Had a scary experiance today! Car has just about 5k on the clock. I was going for a nice run on a 4 lane pkwy. 2 lanes running north and 2 south, with additional turnign lanes to go left across it or right off it. I decided at the next street I could make a left onto, I was going to go south by making a U-turn and yes a U-turn is legal in that spot. As I am entering my uturn, I notice the car is barely moving and just high reving. Of course, now on coming cars are approaching! It all happened very fast , but I remember I kept putting my foot down on the clutch and it seemed the clutch was sticking and I even looked to see if my mat rode up on it or something. I was cycling my feet fast between the clutch pedal and accelerator to the the hell moving. The car then finally moved forward a little more and I got out of harms way. Then the burning smell filled the cabin.Thank god I had the ware withall to abort my uturn and go straigt and get the hell off the parkway. What really puzzles me, is that it was able to move a little while this clutch issue / sticking was happening. I never had any indication of this before and after the incident all was normal again. Has this been an issue w/ the 997.2 / 997??? Regardless, I am bringing it in.

RollingArt

Sounds like a pressure plate issue.




Phil

SARGEPUG

That's what I am summizing thru research. I read of a known issue of the bolts not be torqued out of the factory properly, due to machine calibration error or something of that nature. However, this guy had an 06' and one would think it would have been Rectified by now, if that is infact the issue.
I have owned manuals all my life and logged well over a 100k between them all. From a pathetic Suzuki Samurai, Jeep Wrangler, mustang gt, multiple Roush supercharged mustangs an M3, my Targa, etc , etc and never once had a clutch issue. Now I do w/ the new Porsche!!!

Grummantiger

Had same issue mine had something todo with the teeth in the plate being sheared. Was replaced under cpo.

SARGEPUG

I took it on a good test today. It had absolutely no indication of clutch issues at all. I dove her hard today, swimming thu 1st tru 5th and shifting near redline. Drove her up hills at 40 mph in 4th and even went up a steep grade in 6th! Nothing, not even a hint of slippage. Pedal felt consistent thru the whole day and never stuck, vibrated, etc. I basically put it thru all the test I read about.
WAS IT ME! Maybe it was me yesterday. I have had my shift pattern and everything pertaining to a manual all backwards, since I put soo many miles (600) on the Targa and barely 100 since on the C2S. Maybe I screwed up my foot position or gear selection?? I am not sure I will bring it in now and open up a can of worms. Car seems to be flawless and the only time in all 5k on the clock there was an issue, was the incident yesterday. What do you guys think?

alexb76

Well. clutch issues cannot remedy themselves really... so if you don't encounter the same thing, it could be just you making a mistake changing gears... I suspect that to be the case mostly because you were in a panic/dangerous situation and your nervs might have made you make a mistakes.

I've done something similar, skipping gears when I was in a rush trying to get out of the way of traffic in a hurry and being nervous.

Doc GTO

If it overheated by not being seated properly then once it cools it will act fine. I would still get it looked at. It still may be the pressure plate.

SARGEPUG

I hear ya doc, but I can't see how it overheated before the incident, because I was simply putzing along on the parkway behind some fools going 55. That's when I got pissed and pulled my maneuver to go the other way. Yesterday if anything, the clutch was getting much more work that the day of the incident. I was really working thru all the gears at high rpm shifts, multiple hi gear / low speed uphill tests, etc. I read that when a car is seldom used, sometimes something can build up on the clutch plate, that needs to be "burned off". Maybe a binding actuator? If it wasn't driver error, which I still doubt, maybe it was one of those or a freak one off occurance. Here is a good thread I found relating to this, it's title is "Did a dumb thing. Please advise."
If it becomes an issue and it is a pressure plate, is that covered by warranty?

utkinpol

5K is not much.
my clutch died last week friday, just as i was driving home from whole day at DE event - i simply stepped on gas hard trying to pull out from traffic as it snapped, i think it was pressure plate - now pedal goes down very soft, clutch engages way up high and slips if i press hard on gas.
car has 54K miles, last 14K are pretty much all AX and DE events. $2K clutch job is now due plus potentially $1k extra for new flywheel if it`s worn out bad.

SARGEPUG

That's my point, 5k is nothing! I also don't have any of your symptons. I really think it was my error or a fluke, one off occurance. However, if it is a pressure plate, is it warrantied? Also, the only way they will be able to tell, is if the car has symptoms, which it doesn't. So it wouldn't make sense for me to bring it in unless it is having symptons, correct? This month, I have the car 2 yrs, so I have another 2 years on it.

alexb76

Most likely you're just fine...

SARGEPUG

Say down the road it is a pressure plate issue. How does a dealer / mechanic determine if it is? If the car is asymptomatic, there will be no way to tell other than tearing it down, correct?

utkinpol

i think you just had a local overheat which resulted in temporarily slippage.
when pressure plate goes your clutch engagement point shifts and clutch feels totally dofferent. if car now feels just the same as it always was - do not worry, just stop 'riding' the clutch. proper way to 'drop' it is to make an contact with low revs feeling that car started to move, then press it down just a hair so car stops moving, get RPMs to 5K something, then quickly release clutch pedal with pressing gas to the floor same time. if done properly it does not heat up plates too bad, they are made to survive this. until they decide not to, like with me yesterday.

with dealers any clutch related issues usually not covered by warranty including labor to drop tranny down and it would take a heck of an effort to make them do it as a warranty job. i would not count on it. when clutch is gone and starts to slip all the time you will notice it, trust me, it is difficult not to notice as car does not drive normally anymore.
with my car i am doing lot of stuff now as tranny goes down - RMS, motorsport AOS, LN eng. IMS retrofit, Guards TBD as it is on sale now and i want it. so, yet another $5K or so gets dumped into this bucket on wheels and brings my annual total car expenses to its usual average of $10K. c`est la vie.

SARGEPUG

Thanks for the info and I am well schooled on what you are saying clutch wise. I was in no way "dropping it" nor ever did, that's Mustang / Vette territory. I started with clutches when I was 12 on dirt bikes! Also started driving manual cars @ 15 (now i'm 41) and have owned many many manuals without a hint of clutch issues. The one thing I must say, is that I have the car in sport mode all the time. It takes a well trained foot / feel to start cleanly from a stop. It's very easy to over rev or get some jerking, because the throttle is so sensitive. I had it down to a science, but since I put many miles on the Targa, I need to readjust my feel. I actually remember leaving the gas station in a poor high rev manner to get cleanly going, that was about 10 min before the incident! I think that might have been the culprit, but why would a $100k+ sports car clutch be so sensitive! Also, the 997.2s have the adjustable one to limit overheating, correct?

Vancouver-BC

When I was looking at 997s the salesperson indicated that not having a sports chrono was an advantage on a car with manual transmission--of course one could always turn it off. He said they run into more clutch problems on cars with sports chrono than those without.