I am guessing that you don't make a lot of high RPM shifts My fluid becomes dark within 2 weeks ... especially if I've been doing a lot of "fun driving"

 

Just a question. Do Porsches and other performance cars have the same problem or is it a design issue with our cars ?

 

Thanks for the link R&L. I have a little over 3500 miles on mine, guess I should take a look at it when I take the cover off today.

Grats on getting your car fixed right and hats off to the Bowling Green folks for doing the right thing.

 

So sorry for you misfortune.

 

Only car this has ever happened, and I've had quite a few. More like a 'design issue', it's cheap parts, lack of a proper seal on the slave, or both.
But if we deal with this issue since new, and don't let that crap become crud, it shouldn't have any long-term consequences. The real solution is to do a full bleed as early as possible since new, to get all the accumulated crap from the system. Then a full bleed every two years maximum, as required in all hydraulic systems using brake fluid. The 'reservoir sucking' method is better than nothing, but not a solution. It should be used BETWEEN BLEED JOBS, not as a substitute of a bleed job, but to each his own.

 

I'd have a lot more to worry about than clutch fluid if I was running an auto w 12PSI through my maggie.

 

Have 5k on my car and after 3 track days and owning for 10 months, it was really black. Changed it out using the Ranger method and cleaned the cap. Going to BIR track day tomorrow. Bleeding the brakes is next up.

 

Please allow me to express my heartfelt condolences on your purchase.

 

I'm a believer now. Drove up to the car wash and the clutch action was smooth and non-grabby. I wouldn't have believed it could be that big a difference.

 

Wow some of you do this every 500 miles!!!!!!!

Unbelievable!!!

 

This process is so easy and cheap to do I think I will do it every thousand miles or so.

 

Exactly...Randy you should not be having to do this at all...if I were you I would take it back and have it looked at. No car I have ever owned have I had to mess with the clutch fluid like this.

I can't believe all of you put up with this on a 50k-100K car... This is not normal.

 

I just did mine last night.. its the 5th time in 12k...and guess what? the fluid stayed clean after the second change and pump! I think its going to get easier now.

 

Coming from an Auto guy take this with a grain of salt....no offense.

This comes down to how you drive the car, and how much power you are trying to push through it. It really is that simple.

Think of it like brake dust...if you hot rod around and are hard on your brakes at ever corner and every stop light, they will wear and you will see brake dust on your front wheels in no time. If your wife drives the same car and is easy on it she may not see brake dust on the front wheels, ever.

If you are shift at high rpm's at times and/or if you are putting down a few hundred HP over stock, the clutch essentially does the same thing. Drive it hard, chit wears and gets dirty.....drive it like a baby and she can be clean forever.

I do the ranger method every time I fill it with gas, which is about once or twice per month when its nice out. Some of the other guys I run around with that are heavily modded do it every time they close the garage door. (weekly)

 

No offense taken...I don't claim to know a whole lot, this just seems very strange to me. I have driven cars real hard in my 25 years of beating on them and never did I need to mess with clutch fluid like this. Sure the clutch wore out, but never had to mess with the fluid.

Next time I'm at the cars and coffee I will ask all the Porsche/Audi/VW and Mercedes people how often they have to do this. I'm interested in how common this is in all other models now.

 

At least on the bleeding side of the issue, the real fix is for the factory to install a remote bleeder similar to a Tick (several aftermarket companies offer them now).

 

Another Chevy: The clutch master cylinder in my '02 Camaro SS failed after only 65K miles (10 years time, though). I've never heard of this happening, and obviously this was a first for me. I hope it's not the case of GM assembling the car with the cheapest and lousiest part available. Perhaps it was an aberration, I don't know.

No, I never changed the Camaro's clutch fluid prior to the failure.

It seems to be a design issue with the C6, rather than a hardware issue, though.

 

Don't bother; it's NOT normal. Well, it's 'normal' for the Vette, but not on other cars. GM just plainly cheaped out. The root cause of the issue has to be a lack of a proper 'dust seal' (maybe $1 extra?) on the slave, or none at all. That not only prevents clutch dust and other debris from contaminating the fluid, but prevents premature failure of the slave due to 'piston' wall scoring. It can also be cheap seals and line extensions, but those should stop releasing crap soon after new. Or both.

I'm going to find out soon enough. Will do a full bleed at the 3K mile mark, when I change all fluids. If fluid starts getting black after that, it's the lack of dust seals on the slave. How you drive the car should have ZERO effect on clutch fluid. The only variable that could justify incorporating some contaminants is how many times you depress the clutch, not at what rpm. But when you have no freaking seals, then it becomes an issue, which I'm pretty sure that's the case with us, because I've never seen this problem in Ferraris, BMWs, Porsches, or even cheapo manual cars. We just have to live with it. No biggie if you don't let it get black. The first flush is essential IMO. It shouldn't get that bad after that.

 

Every time I go to the track I change it. Before and after, just like the brakes.

 

If it's a design issue, it's not going to be fixed most likely. I'll be doing it every oil change anyways. Only takes a few minutes. Before, I thought I might be having a clutch issues is was so grabby. Now it's smooth as silk.