Great To Be Alive

Update with Disclaimer: Clutch adjustment is a very important procedure. If you don't have a service manual, and don't understand what you are adjusting, you can very easily screw up your car. I'm not advocating doing this... just wanted to share the below as supplementary information I found very helpful when I adjusted mine.

I know there are a ton of clutch freeplay adjustment threads on this board... for some reason nobody really explained it the way I could understand it like Billman does on this thread:

https://www.s2ki.com/forums/index.php?showt...0&#entry5612837

Just wanted to share since this thread didn't come up readily in the searches I perfomed with "Clutch Adjustment" etc.

Billman ... great description of rod play Vs. master cylinder play. For some reason, I never understood the bleeder valve consideration until you explained it in this thread.

I adjusted about 80% of the rod freeplay out on my 2008 S, and do notice an improvement in shifting feel... expecially when cold. I definitely think I had some clutch drag going on. I'm going to adjust once more to see if I can get it down to zero rod freeplay to maxmiize the feel. I may back off the clutch switch to raise the pedal a bit first... but my clutch height is already higher than brake, so not sure how much higher I want to go.

If you are around Billman, is there any issue in slightly compressing the master? i.e. taking up 100% of the rod freeplay and then ever so slightly more? key emphasis on "ever so slightly" as I know you don't want to near the bleeder valve point and eliminate the master cylinder play altogether.

Chris_Lum

Good read

zeroptzero

yup my prescription to having a smooth shifting tranny includes lengthening the clutch rod. It gives a bit more time of disengagement during shifts which the tranny likes, yet it doesn't slow the shifting any. I didn't take mine as tight as Billman250 suggested as I wasn't sure if it could be that tight at the time, but I find his description helpful.

Billman250

Forgot about that one

I've been writing resolutions on s2ki since 2002. I pretty much have already written an answer for every problem imaginable. But for some reason searching seems to always be a problem here.

Billman250

Little pressure is ok. Just make sure you don't compress the piston any.

This discussion always brings up the possibility of have the clutch partially disengaged, and the throwout bearing being engaged.

I assure you it is not the case. This is the absolute best setting for the rod. So ignore any one that differs

w00t692

You know, My pedal has freeplay in it, but in all honesty, when i start to press the clutch pedal the clutch is disengaged within the first 20% of the pedal. The back 80% of the pedal is all extra disengagement. Would i actually benefit from this in anyway? Because this transmission is exceptionally notchy when cold.

w00t692

I had to replace the stock cmc as it started leaking badly even bleeding the fluid VERY often.

So there's a new one in there now, but even after replacement i didn't notice a difference in shift quality (i bled the fluid extremely often due to it getting very dirty all the damn time.)

All the rest of the stuff is done. I'm just leaning towards the trans being beat up.

Great To Be Alive

Hard to say if this will help... if your clutch isn't dragging, then probably not. For me it seemed to help and I only had about one full turn of rod play.

Billman: For all those happy customers you adjusted rod play for, did you mess with the pedal height at all to get more throw on the pedal itself? i.e. Back of the clutch switch at all? Thought about experimenting with that, but my back hurts from just getting up in there once already

Billman250

Never had to mess with the height by moving the switch.

fastD

I just finished adjusting mine to "zero" freeplay from about 3/4 of an inch. Now I need a lock pin for the pedal pin. Once it stops raining I'll take it for a drive and see if the cold 2nd gear crunch is gone...