My car has about 12,000 miles on it. The clutch seems not to engage until the top couple inches of travel. Is this adjustable? I bought the car with about 6k miles on it so I guess the original owner could have burned it up but it seems a bit unlikely. I am not smelling disc nor the there appear to be any evidence of slippage. I want some feedback before I take it to the dealer for the steering lock recall. Anyone?
When I had a stock clutch...it would engage pretty high up. I went to a Spec clutch at about 20K miles due to the dreaded sticking clutch pedal.
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MTI 383 Stroker Motor. 475 rwhp 450 rwtq. Sold to Kens06.
2006 Toyota Tacoma NCM # 23186
Life is tough, but it's tougher when you're stupid...John Wayne.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Well a rising release point is a sign of clutch wear, but I'm pretty sure the clutch is self adjustable. I know w/ my mustang you had to periodically pump the clutch pedal (car off) to make it self-adjust. My Z06's release point will vary some. I think as the clutch adjust itself the release point returns to what's "normal" to me.
Actually the clutch seems pretty bad now. It bites hard enough that the car will fishtail a bit from a second gear punch, but when I was in some slow traffic going up a hill yesterday it shuddered a bit when I engaged it to creep forward. I hope I have a shot at warranty on it with less than 12,000 miles but I am not holding my breath. I am kind of choked that it is going so early. My 2 Dodge Stealths both had over 370hp in a much heavier AWD car and those clutches went over 50,000 miles.
Well mine just gave up minutes ago. Smells terrible and slips like hell in third. It was replaced about 7000k ago due to sticking on floor problem Consinantly finding the weakest link. Maybe one day it will be down to just drivers license as the weaskest link.
It's pretty normal for the clutch to have a couple of inches of free travel before it starts to feel like it's engaging. Mine's been that way since I bought the car (it had about 50 miles on it when I bought it). I don't think you need to be too worried unless the clutch is slipping. I do agree that the clutch hydrolics are the weakest link on these cars though. I have also experienced the sticking peddle problem numerous times.
One thing I did to my car that made a big difference is remove the clutch return spring. Removing the spring made the clutch a very tiny bit heavier, but it also made it so that I could feel when the clutch bites. Being able to feel the clutch engaging made my shifting MUCH smoother and also made it so that the peddle no longer gets stuck down when the clutch starts acting up (it still will fail to disengage, but the peddle doesn't get stuck.. Giving me a chance to pump it a few times to bring back pressure to the hydrolics). I've tried numerous times to get GM to fix it, but the dealers always give me the run around (I hear things like working as intended, no problem found, etc...) The first thing that is getting done to this car when it is paid off is the whole clutch system is getting upgraded. The stock one is a total piece of crap IMHO.
Go check out this thread. I did some detailed clutch pedal engagement measurements awhile back. Good reference for a stock clutch with not many miles and no abuse on it.
My 04 Z has 800 easy miles on it. The clutch has NEVER been abused, only babied. Most of the 800 miles have been highway miles. I'm the only driver. The friction point on my clutch is very high in the pedal travel. The friction point is so high in the pedal travel it almost seems like there is no point in pushing the clutch pedal all the way in when shifting (but I do anyway).
Different dealer test drive and they still think the clutch is fine. Maybe I am thinking about it too much. Oh well. Lot's of warranty left.
Go measure your clutch pedal and compare to what I measured on mine in the link above! If you have nothing to compare it to you will never know what's "normal".
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