Post DMF and Clutch observations and question

**Snizzers** · 10th August 2012, 14:09

Hello there. After finally giving in to the bag of spanner noise that was my dual mass flywheel I went and got it changed last week and seeing it had 110,000 miles on it I thought Id get the clutch and slave cylinder done at the same time. After being the best part of £1000 poorer the clutch operation is puzzling me and im not sure if its normal.

First of all it is so much lighter; a small child could push it easily, is this normal? Thats not so bad I suppose but the bite point is also towards the bottom of the travel; poss an inch off the floor; is this normal?? Also the 1st part of its motion is really light; like its doing ****** all. Also a couple of times the pedal even fails to come back up to its resting position after it was pressed; not normal.

Now I know a lot of threads talk about bleeding and its a pain etc and I have taken it back to garage who have done this 2 - 3 times now but it is little different. The clutch was perfect before all the work by the way. They have started to say the master cyl might be going?? It just seems too much of a coincidence. Any advice would be greatly apreciated.
cheers Neil

**Gavin2.6** · 10th August 2012, 15:27

Had same type of issues after replacing clutch's before. Sounds like its not being bleed correctly or the new slave or master may have a leak and loosing pressure. Did the garage use a pressure bleed tool or just pump it manually. Works best with pressure bleed.

Any fluid around either the master or bottom of box.

The travel should be lower the newer slave is and also a little lighter as new one should be a little more free than a worm one.

Sounds all fine expect the pressure loss in the clutch. Find the leak then should show you what the issue is.

Do remember having to rip out a box from a 2.6 vec b due to the copper linkage in the box from where the clutch pipe joins the slave developing a leak. Also check the mount on the top of the box where the fluid line joins the pop on connector. Some times they come loose and you need to bend the clip narrower to allow it tog rip the connector more.

ijk571 · 10th August 2012, 23:32

My zafira 's slave cylinder was leaking when I lost ALL pressure in the pedal (ie totally floppy), very recently and I had no clutch. The garage recommended replacing the clutch whilst the gearbox was out, as I'd done 80k in it and it was prudent to change it as a precaution. Anyway, the DMF was failing to so a Solid conversion kit was fitted at the same time. The pedal is much lighter now, so is my wallet at about 900 pound.

Anyway, I'd have thought they would have recommended changing the cylinder as well whist the other bits were being changed on yours as most of the expense in replacing the cylinder would have been the labour (6hours+). Are they saying the new one may be leaking?

**Snizzers** · 7th September 2012, 14:00

Gavin

thanks for reply; ive not had much chance to get on here since the holidays etc, but I have checked a few things and got more information. I'm not sure if they used a pressure bleed system but I will try to find out.

I have topped up the system twice now with say 20 - 30 ml of fluid. One thing I did notice this time was that the fluid in the reservoir seemd to have contamination in one of the reservoir compartments as in the picture. It looks like a green 'storm cloud' of crap sort of suspended in the fluid. Hopefully the pic shows thisreserv.jpg

I pulled the big plastic cover off the bottom of the engine bay and had a good look round and did not find any brake/clutch fluid leaks at all. I looked at brake lines, master cylinder and the big distribution block all look good.

On your last paragraph i'm not quite sure what all this is?? would that be the same on a vec c? I'm wondering if they got crap in the hydraulic line (engine oil/gear oil??) when they put the new slave on? does oil react with brake fluid? Might do a wee experiment tonight and mix some up in a jam jar!!

One thing I notice is that once topped up the clutch feels better; more functioning travel, higher etc. The level dropped about 1 cm over 3 weeks?

Cheers
Neil C

**Snizzers** · 7th September 2012, 14:03

Thanks for reply. I did get the clutch, DMF and slave all done at the same time. As you say it makes sense when you already have it in bits.

It seems better after a couple of top ups but maybe getting contaminated from somewhere.

rgds
Neil

**Snizzers** · 5th October 2012, 10:31

Hi guys, some more updates on my clutch saga.
My car continued to loose small amouts of fluid and it was found that the master cylinder had a small leak. This could be seen inside the car above the pedal. There is a small rubber bellows (dust boot??) that covers the moving parts. This was quite wet. The mystery was/is where all the fluid was going as there was none on the carpet or floor. The chaps at the garage said it was likley running between the engine bay wall (separting the engine bay from the car; firewall??) and the sound proofing stuff that is stuk to the wall. This seemed plausable as the bottom of the bell hosuing was bone dry.

Incidently I have a question about this. There is a small deliberate gap at the bottom of the clutch bell housing and you can see a small bit of the flywheel here. If there was a leak of the slave cylinder, would the fluid run out this hole? Or is it located in such a way that any leak would direct the fluid somewhere else??

Anyway after the master cyl change (£140 all in) the leakage rate seems to have stopped now or is very slow. The level has gone down a bit but cant tell if its due to the cold weather/contraction/change ?? Now it feels better than the state after 1st chaning clutch in my 1st post, but it still feels like part of its travel is not doing anything (spongy). The the other day on depressing the clutch the pedal only returned half way back and stayed there for several miles before springing back up of its own accord.

I'm getting fed up with this now, the garage is loosing interest. If you have a dispute with a garage, where do you stand if you have a dissagreement over work such as this. I have read somewhere that you have the right to get the work re-done elsewhere and the original garage has to pay if the fault is theirs. How does this work

cheers again