redr2

my 02 Civic LX has the same issue. 110,000 miles on the car.

started as a squeaky pedal and got worse to what i would describe as almost clicking or creaking when the pedal is first applied.

today i did work on it. mine was making noise in and out of the car.

the inside, i did as above and bought some good spray in lithium grease in an aerosol can and used the little tube to pump a bunch in the hole.

then followed the tips for the outside where it was squeaking under the rubber boot where it meets the tranny. outside is a much easier fix than it sounds. two bolts and you pull the piece off and I used some good lithium grease in the "dimple" where the shaft slides into. it was very dry and the outside squeak is totally gone.

BUT ---- I the inside went away for about 5 miles and now its completely back. was fluid smooth at first and now the clicking and creaking is back for about the top 2 inches when i push in the pedal. very annoying. i may try and shorten up some of the free play. it almost seems that the pin sliding into that clutch master cylinder is binding almost as though its going in on funny angle. i hate it so much i will consider selling the car if I cannot repair. it makes a noise every time the pedal is pushed in.

redr2

Okay, so I got home tonite and ripped it apart again. I am going on a road trip tomorrow and will hate life if I have to put up with this noise and the feel of the creaking clutch pedal the whole trip.

The outside squeak at the slave cylinder is still nice and quiet.

The noise was the inside for sure. As per several threads on the Internet (including 8th gen Civics) it appears the problem is in the master cylinder...read on.....

I removed the entire clutch pedal assembly.

the small shaft attaching to the pedal and into the master cylinder appears to be quite sloppy. I removed all the grease. There is basically a ball attached to the end of the shaft where it mounts into a round socket in the master cylinder. The shaft cannot be removed from the master cylinder as there is no circlip I can see.....There loooks to be some consderable wear in where the ball mounts into the socket....causing it to wiggle around quite a bit. I suspect this excessive play seems to be what is causing the shaft to slide in and out somewhat erratically and almost binding .

The excessive play and no rubber bushing is not doubt what is pushing all the grease out.

I tried something new. I uased a syringe left over from my kids children advil, filled it with lithium grease and pumped as much as I could into the socket....like packing a bearing. I then had smome 1/8" rubber mat. I cut it out the size of a quarter and then made an inner hole slightly larger than the shaft.....a slit down the side helps slide it over the shaft. Weird, yes.

Its really my last ditched effort to keep some grease in this area and act as a bit of a seal.

Every joint and spring in the clutch pedal assembly was majorly applied with spray in lithium grease. I will report back and see how it goes but I think it needs a new master cylinder....too much play in the system.

redr2

well back from road trip. Well over 300 miles in stop and go traffic (border line ups) and so far so good.

I think one of the keys here is that you must remove the entire clutch pedal assembly.....its only 3 bolts and a small clip where that pin hooks into the pedal. By removing the entire assembly you can get grease into that little socket where the ball sits in the master cylinder.........the problem I see with just spraying in the hole is you are really only lubing the shaft/rod. Once you get it all apart you can see that grease on that little rod does nothing once so ever.....the contact point is only where the ball meets the little socket in the master cylinder. I will report back in a month to see if it lasts.

I should also mention I took out a very small amount of free play in the pedal so that the rod always tracks the same.....a very small amount 1/16" and you can see how it tracks slightly smoother. this whole set up is actually quite sloppy. not what I normally see with a Honda

pheaton

iTrader: (6)

Worked for me. I have a 2001 Civic LX.

At first I thought I just had the inside pedal noise. I used the white lithium grease I found at the parts store. I took off the plastic pieces by the pedals and got down there with the flash light like a contortionist and looked at where the clutch connection goes into the firewall. When you press the pedal about half way you notice the opening get a little larger. So I wedged the flash light under the floor mat to free up both hands. Then I pressed the pedal down and put the straw of the grease into the hole and gave it a good spray. The pedal noise was gone.

That's when I realized that I had the noise in the engine bay as well. So I started looking at that. I wasn't sure how it worked and ended up taking it apart. I started by shooting some grease randomly behind the boot, but when I checked it, it still made noise. So I decided to take it loose. I realized once I got it apart I was shooting the grease at the wrong spot. Now that I understand how that joint works I don't think I'll have to remove it next time. You have to shoot the grease toward the passenger side around the ball. If you are like me it's one of those things that may not understand until you take it off. It wasn't hard, I had no problems with the pedal going to the floor, I assume as long as you put it together correctly it'll all be just fine.

As someone said all you do is remove the two 12mm bolts that hold the slave cylinder on. Once the bolts are off the assembly more or less falls apart in your hands. Take note as it's coming apart so you know how it goes back on. It's not hard at all. The ball goes toward the passenger side, the shaft to the drivers side. I sprayed the ball down and the fork it goes into. I put it all back together and the noise is gone! Yes!

Again, now that I know how it works, if I have to do this again I might be able to do it without taking it apart, but it's certainly worth it to get rid of that annoying noise.

I drove around all day and everything is still quiet. Hopefully it'll stay for awhile.

Rockstar18729

Awesome pictures and amazing help.....here goes a noob question....Where is the slave cylinder!?!?!?!? I have been looking and looking and am having the hardest time finding it.

I have looked at pictures of what it looks like, read where it's suppose to be and nothing.

PLEASE PLEASE help. All I need to do is bleed the slave cylinder but it's hard to do that when you can't find it.

Thanks

pheaton

iTrader: (6)

The pedal is still quiet, but the noise under the hood came back. . DOH. . Oh well. it was quiet for awhile. The ball is probably too worn out. . No biggie.

flirp

I've recently bought an 03 Civic 1.4 si at auction, will be sorting out a few niggles before putting it on the road. Anyway this guide was very helpful finding the source of the clutch squeak - when I packed the slave cylinder push rod socket with grease, there was silence for 5-6 pedal presses.

I figure the push rod ball end is too worn for greasing to be a long lasting fix, and got a new one today from the local Honda dealership (part number 46948S5A003, £7.87 + massive VAT).

I'm not fitting it till the rain stops, hopefully on the weekend.

One thing I notice is that the old push rod seems to have been plated with something like brass - possibly to cut down on noise, before it wore away? - whereas the new one is unplated.

Old push rod:
[IMG][/IMG]

Old versus new, goldy one is the old push rod:


Comparison of the ball ends:


My thanks to the original poster and the fellow who retook the photos.
ps - the torque setting for the slave cylinder mounting bolts is 22Nm, mine were MUCH tighter, was afraid I'd round them off trying to remove them...

flirp

Bit of sun today. I cleaned everything up, fitted the new push rod, regreased with Castrol red brake grease, and... no squeaks! Let's hope it lasts.

Rockstar18729, I took some photos to show where everything is. Bear in mind this is a Brit car, yours may be different. Hope it helps.

First off, this is the worn push rod, with plastic thing and rubber gaiter as it came off the car:



With the bonnet open, the area to look for is between the exhaust headers and the battery:



Closer in, the slave cylinder is circled in green, below the earthing strap and partially obscured by thick black hoses and an electrical connection. You can follow the thin steel hydraulic pipe to find the slave cylinder.



Closer in still, here is the hydraulic pipe (highlighted in blue) that leads into the slave cylinder, the slave cylinder's bleed nipple (pink), the bolts you have to unscrew to free the slave cylinder (brown - one hidden behind an electrical connection) and the rotating nut (green) that you will spin the slave cylinder around to get the push rod out.



When you've disconnected the electrical wires as described in the op's guide,unscrew the bolts (brown) reach your hand into the rubber boot and disconnect the push rod from its fork by rotating the slave cylinder around the nut (green). This way, the rigid hydraulic pipe (purple) isn't bent or stressed. In the photo below, I've removed the rubber boot and spun the slave cylinder away from the fork by 180 degrees, to ease clean out old grease and dirt from the fork, and pulling out the worn push rod.



Cleaning up the fork (purple) with brake cleaner, rigid hydraulic line highlighted in blue for some reason:



New push rod lightly greased (I filled the fork cavity with grease), gaitered, and put in place on the slave cylinder:



To reassemble, I rubbed grease into the rubber boot, swung the slave cylinder back around towards the fork, pushed the big rubber boot over the push rod's rubber gaiter, clicked the push rod into the fork, and eased the rubber gaiter into its cavity. I needed an extra pair of hands to photograph all that, so I'm afraid there's no pics. I didn't need to jack the car up.

scootergmc

How many miles/kms did you have on it? Mine's pushing 200,000 miles and I think I'm due for a new rod...

flirp

There's 62,848 miles on the clock, so you've done pretty good to get 200,000! My last manual car had an old style cable operated clutch so I had no idea about slave cylinders and push rods till I read this thread.

This is my first Japanese machine, my other cars have been European. To be honest I probably had an inflated idea of Honda reliability, apart from the push rod squeak, the clutch release bearings are very noisy for 63k miles, and I was surprised that I'll need to find sealant as well as a new rocker cover gasket to cure the oil weep it has.

inifiniteblur

lets see some pix for the clutch release bearings. i know nothing about clutch problems. this is my first manual. your last post was very helpful thank you flirp

Osd_cano

thanks for this man

llmercll

I tried the slave cylinder fix using some moly ep grease, but it only went away for about 6 pedal presses.

Will White lithium grease work better?

thanks!

llmercll

I got some lithium grease and it didn't help either. It's silent for about 2-3 pedal presses, then starts lightly squeaking, then goes full blown.

I'm guessing I have the same issue as flirp and will probably need a new pushrod.

Is there any possibility that taking the old one and sanding it could fix it? or possibly wrapping some duct tape on the end of it?

thanks!

llmercll

I took out the pushrod again, sanded it so it's smooth, and even put some duct tape over the head. Still squeaks. After driving awhile however, it is silent, until it sits overnight again and I'm back where I started.

Any ideas? I would really appreciate some input =)

GreenMachineDX

Can someone take a pic of these 2 bolts how does it look like?

flirp

llmercll, you've obviously got more patience than I have, but how many more times are you going to take apart the slave cylinder before you get sick of it? I can really only advise bunging in a fresh push rod (mine is still silent btw) and stop the thing taking up your free time.

GreenmachineDX, I'm afraid I don't understand you question. If it helps, I blogged a more wordy version of what I posted above beginning here.

edit - oh, infiniteblur, the clutch bearing noise turned out to more serious - the input shaft bearing in the gearbox. Apparently this is quite common! Well Honda, fool me once, shame on you. There won't be a twice! I can get unreliable cars far more cheaply elsewhere!

Funkcrusader

there is actually another thread with a video of a guy taking out the clutch master cylinder, and he also helps locate the slave cylinder. Just did the inside and under the hood in my civic, no more squeak, and shift does seem slightly faster and definetly smoother. very easy to do, i used high temp grease that u can buy from auto zone, cost 5 bucks, took me about 20 mins to do it b/c i had trouble lining up the screws when i put it back together, dont think they had tall ppl with big hands in mind. =D

Funkcrusader

[autostream]http://autostream.com/ibcivicforums/?page_type=firebirdplayerthumbnail&framepage=153&t ransactionid=1353722431-68200216152&posted_by=_www.civicforums.com&youtube _video_id=c-m5F0zEvyo[/autostream]


Video i found that helps identify where things are if the pics dont help.

Flirp did great job with the pics

Salt and Light

Thank you very much for this thread!! After almost one year of my O5's clutch, squeaking and popping, I'm finally noise free!!!

Drew0306

Great pics and info, thanks.

bsmiley

I replaced my clutch slave cylinder and had a lot of difficulty bleeding afterward. I bought this: http://www.harborfreight.com/brake-f...der-92924.html pneumatic brake bleeder for $28.
Followed instructions and bled all the air, clutch pedal pressure returned and it feels great!