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So I was starting my car today and pushed the clutch down to turn the key. Almost immediately, I felt something was off. I felt something pop while I was pushing the clutch down and when I took my foot off, the pedal would not come back up!! I had to use my hand to manually pull it up. Since I was by myself at night and I had to get home, I tried to get the car started anyways and drove myself home. Eventually after pulling the clutch back up with my hand, it does pop back up, but not as springy as before. Lots of slack.

Here's what I noticed while driving. Normally, I can release my clutch about 1-2 in where it will be slipping. After about 2 in, the clutch will be fully engaged. Now, once I lift my foot 0.5 in , the clutch is already fully engaged. The rest of the way up once it's engaged feels like slack. You can imaging how tricky it is to start from 1st gear like that with barely any slipping room.

So I popped open the hood and looked at the slaved cylinder and noticed this. The slave cylinder is held by 2 bolts. One of them has been sheared off (see pic). Now it is only held by 1 bolt and that is not enough to keep it from pivoting around that bolt. The other half of the bolt stuck inside the hole.

So do you guys think my clutch problem is because of the loose slave cylinder? Any idea how I can remove the sheared off bolt that is stuck inside the hole? Is this something I can do myself or does it need to be done at the shop?

Thanks


Here I am holding the piece that should be bolted onto the slave cylinder.



A close look of the sheared off bolt that should be inside that hole.

 
Rep Power: 210

Based on your description I think you are correct. As far as removing the sheared off bolt, there are a couple of possibities. There are reverse twist drill bits that drill in a counterclockwise direction. Sometimes just drilling out the bolt with one of these will back it out. The bits are hard to find and can be expensive and may not work. You can also try a bolt extractor. First you drill a hole in the broken bolt and the extractor is kind of like a tap but it has sharp edges and twists in reverse. The idea is the extractor bites into the bolt and backs it out. I have not had great luck with these, it really depends on how hard the bolt is stuck. The final method I can think of is you drill out the bolt and retap the threads. If the bolt goes into a blind hole, make sure you use a tap designed for that so it cuts the threads as deep as possible. All of these require drilling so you have to have a drill and bit combination that can get into the space.
If you don't have the tools or the time, it may be cheaper to let a shop do it.

 
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Thanks for the reply. Big help