I am neither a motorhead or mechanic, but I have a nice 6 speed C5 and my wife and I enjoy it quite a bit. I don't like paying the crazy dealer repair bills, so I try and do what I can myself ie: column lock and skip shift eliminator problems.

Lately it's been the hydraulic clutch, that is giving me fits. About six month's into owning the car, it was a litlle hard shifting gears and the pedal was dead almost half way down. I checked the clutch fluid and it was low, so I added some DOT3 brake fluid and it was fine for another 6 months. Yesterday, my wife was backing out of the garage and the clutch pedal went completely dead. I checked the fluid again and it was basically full. We are not, as the posts read "hard drivers" the car has never been over 3,000 rpms in any gear. The night before the problem, we were riding around the neighborhood for about twenty minutes checking out the Christmas lights and the majority of this time was in second or third gear. That's about the only thing I can think of that could have any effect on the clutch.

Some posts say, change the fluid and use dot4. How do you get the fluid out? One guy says use a turkey baster. It seems that would only take out what is in the diaphram or bladder in the fill reservoir, and that is not much. How do you drain the whole system?

Someone else says bleed the clutch. How?

How, exactly does the system work? Is there supposed to be a feeder hole in the diaphram that leaches into the fill tank when the fluid is low? If so mine doesn't have one. If not how does the fluid from the diaphram get into the system?

I've learned over the years to go to the easiest fix first and work from there. I feel pretty stupid as changing the fluid would seem to be the place to start and I don't know how to do that!

Any help at all would be appreciated, thanks.

 

Just a comment based on your question about the diaphram. There should be no fluid above the diaphram. The proper way to fill the reservoir is to remove the cap, remove the diaphram, fill the reservoir to the step part way up the inside wall. Replace the diaphram, replace the cap. Stroke the clutch peddle about a dozen times and check the fluid level again. Refill as needed per above.

Bleeding the clutch is very difficult and requires a lift, removal of the 'H' pipe, removal of the tunnel plate and then if you have a small hand you might be able to reach the bleeder located at the front of the torque tube near the top side. Bleed it like you bleed the brakes.

Good luck
Shirl Dickey

 

This is why a Corvette is still "just a Chevy"
My friends Nissan Maxima has a bleeder mounted on the fire wall for bleeding the clutch.
All of the fluids in our cars should be periodically changed. Engine, rear, tranny, brakes, radiator, and hydraulic slave cylinder. Heat is the common denominator when it comes to fluid breaking down, and given enough time.....it will.

 

If you ever tear into the system buy the bleeder line extender which puts the pleed screw in the engine bay so you can easily bleed the system w/o taking the car apart. However make sure you wrap the braided stainless line. Mine chafed through the fuel line while I was 2.5 hours away from home. $500 flat bed later and a $300 repair bill sucked big time. Now the line is wrapped in rubber as is the fuel line.

 

Where do you get a "bleeder line extender"?

We just got a 1998 convertibe and the throw on the clutch seems extremely short. It seems like the first 25% movement from the floor is all that matters.

is there some standard or minimum specification for the clutch travel that I can measure?

Thanks,
Dexter

 

Clutch bleeder:

http://www.thelapd.com/Merchant2/mer...e_Code=thelapd

Good luck Norm

 

Thanks Norm!

Do you have any suggestions on the distance of the throw?

Also, have you installed this part on your car?

Thanks,
Dexter

 

Quincy77,

whereas I am not familiar with the C5 clutch hydraulics yet (ours only has 7k miles, so no problems thankfully), I am intimately familiar with our C4 clutch hydraulics.

With that caveat, I would offer the following thoughts:

1. do not use dot4, only use GM Clutch fluid -- it is Dot3 with both friction modifiers and anti-air entrapment additives, both very valuable for the design and vertical nature of the line between the clutch master and slave.

2. heed the advice of the earlier post regarding not overfilling the master, I would add that the rubber 'moisture' barrier will increase the level of the fluid when installed, so keep the initial level 'just below' the 'low' fill mark, once reinstalling the moisture barrier, it will bring it to the proper level.

3. a typical bleeding trick is to remove the moisture barrier, reinstall the cap, and then pump the clutch pedal 30-50 times, varing the speed, but pausing between each stroke to allow the dislodged air to float to the top.

4. A GM TSB for our 2000 TransAm (same LS1 engine, different tranny), notes the use of a vacume pump (e.g. mityvac) and an adapter (i.e. a rubber cover) to 'bleed' the air out of the clutch fluid. It's a good chance the same will work with your car, if performed by a reliable mechanic, possibly eliminating the need to completely exchange (drain/refill) the fluid (obviously used in conjuction with replacing the fluid in the master at least using the 'turkey baster' method).

One last thought, depending on mileage (every 12k or so), something that can help the shifting become easier/smoother, is to consider changing the tranny fluid (dexron III), but if your is older than a 2002, DO NOT use synthetic Dexron (due to paper vs carbon 'blocker rings').