Clutch sticking

[1qwikSS]

Took my Camaro for a drive today (hasnt been driven in like 3 months) to keep the tires from getting flat spots, make sure the fluids stay circulated, etc.. and the clutch was sticking. the car shifted fine, but when i would push the clutch down it would stick halfway and then finally raise back up the rest of the way after a few seconds. What causes this.....does the fluid need to be changed??

[Fbomb]

I'd guess water in the brake fluid (which is used in the clutch hydraulics). Sounds like the problem guys have when they have a lot of power and didn't do the drill mod.

[1qwikSS]

how in the heck would i have gotten water in the brake fluid?? the car is stock for the most part i.e no major mods...lid, filter, exhaust, and rearend gears. 28,200 miles on it...plus the only water it has ever seen in its life came from the garden hose.

--Double post auto merged--

it almost feels like the clutch pedal needs to be lubricated or something of that nature...like the hinge is gummed up or something

[1BADAIR]

brake fluid absorbs water.
you may have other issues. bad slave, master. air or the disk/slave could be sticking from rust.
air alot of times will cause this. was it hard to get in gear? you can also put in gear and while the clutch is all the way down REV to like 3500-4000 and see if the car tries to move.

[1qwikSS]

it was a little bit hard to get into gear when i first took off, but then got easier as the car warmed up..... would the cold weather have anything to do with that tho?

--Double post auto merged--

brake fluid absorbs water.
you may have other issues. bad slave, master. air or the disk/slave could be sticking from rust.
air alot of times will cause this. was it hard to get in gear? you can also put in gear and while the clutch is all the way down REV to like 3500-4000 and see if the car tries to move.

By "air" are you talking about the air system or the air conditioning??

[1BADAIR]

air in the clutch system.
i would flush the hydauliic system. they should be flushed every few years due the brake fluid properties absorbing water anyway.
flush it them make sure to bleed it good

[1qwikSS]

alright... my dad was saying the same thing...master/slave/air in the line.....so how do i flush the hydraulic lines??? bleed the fluid through the bleeders on the calipers??

[1BADAIR]

remove the fluid from the cup. then refill with fresh. then bleed it. keep bleeding it until you have the refill the resevoir like twice and that should be enough to have fresh fluid in the whole system.
the bleeder is on the slave in the bellhousing. 7/16 socket

[1qwikSS]

alright thanks for the info!

[Fbomb]

k, so I'm hoping that this is the same problem I was having with mine...I kinda tried to "change" out some of the fluid this past summer with a pipette sucking the fluid out of the reservoir and refilling it every week, usually got some nasty black fluid out of it. Is the bleeder just in the bellhousing under the flywheel cover somewhere?

Thanks for all your help Larry.

[1BADAIR]

no cover. its about an inch above the fluid line into the bell on ls1 cars.
it barely sticks out and is a pain to get too.
I use an cheapy 11mm socket on a 1/4inch breaker bar

[mtuggle86]

Chris read this write-up and watch the video Hope it helps

http://www.rangeracceleration.com/Clutch_Care.html

[Fbomb]

That writeup didn't show anything but how to change the fluid from the reservoir. It did have some good info on troubleshooting though, sounds exactly like the problem I was having. What we really need to do though is bleed all the dirty DOT3 from the lines and replace it with DOT4...so should I just empty the line first then bleed in the DOT4 until there's no more air or just add and bleed a ton of DOT4 into it to make sure there's no 3 left?

[1BADAIR]

empty the resevoir and refill it with fresh. then start flushing/bleeding. if you empty the system it will be very hard to bleed and is easy to damage seals

[c0ncEpT]

Yup get a turkey baster and empty the reservoir and refill. Than get under the car and have someone pump up the pedal and than crack the bleeder on the trans with the pedal held to the floor close and repeat.