Clutch pedal would not depress

[kturner]

97 2.3L 5 speed with about 70k miles and has been sitting a while.
Today, I drove it to the inspection station, stopping for gas on the way, which was about 3 miles. They couldnt fit any more inspections in today so I left, or tried to. I made it a few hundred feet before the clutch started acting up. I had to leave it in the parking lot next door because the clutch pedal would not move. It was stuck in the up position. It had a very little bit of give to it, maybe a quarter inch or so. I did a quick visual on the clutch pedal mechanism, master cylinder, the reservoir, the hyd line and the side of the trans. Nothing looked abnormal. Got a ride home and went back about 1.5 hours later. At this point, the clutch pedal behaved normally and I was able to drive it home with no issues.

I saw a handful of reports of this happening online, with possible solutions ranging from flush the fluid to replace the slave cylinder, throwout bearing and while you have the trans out, swap the clutch too.

Anyone seen this? What was the fix?

Keith

 

[RonD]

The Quick Disconnect fitting at the bell housing connection to the Slave could be your problem.
When it is disconnected the clutch pedal will be locked in the up position because there is no where for the fluid to go when you try to push the pedal down.

I would disconnect it and clean it as best you can then reconnect it, there is a Ford tool for this, which isn't expensive, but it can be done with screw drivers.

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

A link to pics of said tool. Use it to press the white plastic collar towards the trans. It can be filled with dirt where the collar is supposed to move into so using air or wd-40 to displace said dirt makes things easier.

https://www.google.com/search?q=ford+clutch+line+disconnect+tool+picture&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

 

[kturner]

The Quick Disconnect fitting at the bell housing connection to the Slave could be your problem.
When it is disconnected the clutch pedal will be locked in the up position because there is no where for the fluid to go when you try to push the pedal down.

I would disconnect it and clean it as best you can then reconnect it, there is a Ford tool for this, which isn't expensive, but it can be done with screw drivers.

I finally got a chance to look at this today. When I finally got the disconnect to pop loose, it dumped every drop of fluid out of the reservoir through the disconnected line. It's the first time I've done anything with one of these clutch line disconnects, but based on the wording of your message, the disconnect should close off the end of the line so that the fluid does not drain out. I'm taking this as a potential sign that I may not need to drop the transmission.

Is there a way to safely work this mechanism to try to get it operating smoothly again?

Assuming so, once I get the coupling to seal the line, is it worth trying to bleed some of the air out using this method before re-connecting it to the slave cylinder?

Thanks
Keith

 

[RonD]

Yes, Quick disconnect is most likely the problem, yes, it is suppose to seal the end of the hose when removed, so operating in reverse would mean it was sealing when connected so you couldn't push down clutch pedal.
You will need to replace master, hose and reservoir, they come as one set.

You could try reconnecting and refilling, then open bleeder on slave and see if pushing on clutch pedal will push fluid out of slave, so hose is open not sealed.....BUT(big but), because of the symptom(pedal locked then unlocked) the quick connect fitting could be cutting off flow randomly so would leave you stranded again.

Good video here on how to bleed new Master before installing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91IYY_YENRw

They use a different type of Quick Connect in the video, but both types work the same, just different methods to release.

 

[96firephoenix]

good thing you didn't try too hard. A lot of people snap the pushrod when this happens.

Could always have been worse.