Last Saturday I bought a used 2000 Silver S2000 at West County BMW here in St Louis Mo. I had test drove this car twice and nothing seemd to be mechanically wrong with it. The night I drove it home from the dealer I began to hear grinding noise every time I depressed the clutch to shift. It began to get worse as I drove it a little that night. I took it back to the dealer on Monday and they told me it was the throw out bearing on the clutch going bad. I tried to drive it to the local Honda dealer because it was still under waranty but never made it to the dealer because the clutch totally went out leaving me to have the car towed to the Honda dealer. The car only has 10,300 miles on it and I can't belive a clutch would fail after the amount of use. Even if the previous owner had driven it hard I can't believe thry could trash the clutch to failure.

Has anyone heard anything about the clutches going out on the s2000's like this. I'm pissed off about the whole thing because I've always wanted an s2000 and already own 2 hondas. Now the dream car I always wanted is sitting at the Honda dealer waiting to have a cluth replaced and I have lost all confidence in the car. Is there a way the dealer who sold it can be held responsible. I can't believe Honda would put weak clutches on these cars.

Any response would be appreciated.

 

Do some searches and you will find many clutch threads. I had two Honda clutches and then installed an aftermarket clutch.

 

Haven't heard of any throw-out bearing failures though. I'm betting it is a limited manufacturing defect and nothing to get concerned about.

 

Have you discussed this situation with the BMW dealer that sold the car to you? Even if it came with an "as is" disclaimer, you may have recourse since the failure occurred so soon after purchase.

The clutch in my MY 2000 car has the deceleration noise, but is fine otherwise with 22k miles on the odo.

 

BMW is pushing it off on the Honda Warranty which the Honda dealer I took it said it would be covered under the warranty so I am covered there. The BMW dealer did give me a loaner car until the problem is fixed and that is all they have offered so far.

After reading the many posts on the forums it seems to me that the one weakness of the S2000 is the clutch and that most serious owners end up replacing them with an aftermarket model anyway.


I should have waited and just bought the new 2002 model so that I know that I have been the only one driving it and don't have to worry that the last bozo who owned it knew how to work a speed clutch.