megawampum

About a month ago, I had to get my clutch replaced as it went out on me while I was driving. It only has 52k miles on it. $1,400 later and everything seemed to be working fine. About a week ago, I parked my jeep (in neutral) in my garage and went on vacation with my family. I just got back and tried to back out of the garage and the clutch has no engagement at all. No pressure, nothing. And I can't shift out of neutral into any gear including reverse. I don't see any leaked fluid anywhere on the garage floor or inside the engine compartment. It's a big mystery. Any ideas as to what the problem might be?

Thanks in advance for your help, and btw, this is my first post. I've been reading the posts on JK-Forum for a couple years, but I'm glad to be interacting with you guys now. You all seem like a very knowledgeable group of people.

Sean

Mr.T

Since it was working fine before parking, and now there is no resistance in the clutch pedal -- I'm 99% certain it's related to the clutch pedal and hydraulic clutch master/slave portion rather than the clutch itself. Suggest crawling under the Jeep and look for brake fluid, and also look under the dash at the clutch pedal itself to see if anything mechanical came off. Since repairs were only a month ago, they should warranty it.

megawampum

Thanks Mr. T. I just checked under the Jeep and in the engine compartment and found no fluid anywhere. I also looked at the clutch pedal under the dash and found nothing out of the ordinary.

Mr.T

Sounds like the mechanic that installed it will have to diagnose it. An interesting set of symptoms, please post the results.

megawampum

So I had to deal with this myself since the mechanic who installed my new clutch was unwilling to take a look at it in a reasonable amount of time. So I replaced the slave cylinder, drained the brake fluid reservoir (looked brown), and then bled the line. It works now but it feels odd - maybe because my slave cylinder has been on its way out for awhile so it hasn’t been working properly.

So here’s a description of how it feels. As I push the clutch in I have about 2” of play before I get resistance. The resistance occurs for about 5” all the way to the floor. After I shift and then start to let up on the clutch, I have about 2” or less before it starts to engage.

Does this sound about normal? Previously it hasnt engaged until about 3” or so.

Thanks for your help.

Mr.T

Mine has ~1" of play when pressing the clutch pedal, so I'd say there is still probably some air in the system. Here's the procedure from the FSM below. There's other methods, but the key point for me is that the slave is slanted (because the engine is slanted) and the high point (that traps air) is opposite the bleeder -- So pumping the rod with the slave removed and the bleeder end slanted higher is the trick.

Smudgeontheglass

Yep, there have been a few stories on the forum it taking several attempts at bleeding out the slave cylinder. Just keep trying until you get a consistent pedal feel.

Mark Doiron

Since you're able to shift, give it a couple days and a few miles of driving. I've replaced my slave cylinder several times and master once (221,000 miles on Jeep) and when it did that, instead of feeling solid, it always came around to feeling normal within a couple hundred miles of driving.