Clutch Master Cylinder Q's

First, I own an '85 2.8L, 5spd (yes, the 2.8 BUT, I have put that motor thru HELL (160,000 miles)and it still purrs, granted, it doesnt travel well on the interstate, but does just fine for me take care of your motor, it will take care of you)

The last few days, my clutch has progressivly gotten worse!
Today I jump in, push on the clutch pedal and it goes straight to the floor, no resistance what-so-ever. After pumping the pedal about 10 to 20 times it will disengage the clutch JUST enough to get into first gear.

The fluid level is fine. Here is my thinking, there just isn't enough fluid getting to the slave cylinder to disengage the clutch, I do not think that it is anything past the slave cylinder so I'm thinking the master cylinder has gone bad, by the way, my clutch pedal has ALWAYS been mushy.

So, does anybody have any other idea's??Should I rebuild or replace the master cylinder or maybe just bleed the system, slave cylinder maybe??If it is the slave, has anybody resorted to cutting a whole in their floorboard to access it from the side??This has been fairly sudden, maybe the last 5 days it went almost straight down hill, I had not drove it for 3 days prior to today.

Thanks Everybody
James

Try your bleeder and see if it at least pumps fluid when the pedal is depressed. If not, then either the Master or Slave may be hosed. If you can break the connection before the line goes into the slave, then you could isolate whether the M/C is pumping. But . . . . . .

I just replaced the M/C and line on my '92 and (even though this is obvious) found that the slightest amount of air in the system would prevent the clutch from operating. We had to bleed, bleed, bleed, bleed forever to get rid of all those teeny bubbles. Make sure that all of your connections are tight and bleed the system well before you decide that a component went bad.

HTH

Mike in NJ atriot:

i went through clutch hell not to long ago. i assume you have the internal slave cylinder. bleed it like crazy and if it still doesn't work you probably will have to replace the slave. my slave leaked air in, but it didn't really leak any fluid out. i had to fix this twice and eventually solved all my problems by converting to the newer external system with the sealed hydraulics. good luck.
dan f.

by the way, if you just replace the master, make absolutely sure that it is set or designed to move the proper amount of fluid to make the slave function properly. too little, or especially too much, will probably make you very unhappy.

Hay Dan. I am interested in doing that conversion to the external slave. How hard was it? What parts did you use?

Clutch hell? I have been through clutch hell. Some of you may remember that series of post! Let me tell you, If your master is bad and you have the internal, replace the slave. If you want to convert to the external you need a belhousing, slave, rod with slave, throw out bearing, and the throwout leaver that is inside the belhousing. I think that is everything.