Hey Guys,

I'm curious if my clutch cable is out of threads at the tranny end. I've drawn what can best be described as the best pen-paper drawing ever. This illustrious illustration illustrates the indignant state of my clutch linkage exactly. The arm that goes to the clutch is all the way against the back of the cable.

If I move the arm closer to the end of the threads, what does that do? (to the right in the picture)

If I move the arm closer to the back of the car, what does that do? (to the left in the picture)

I'd like your guys input because the haynes manual kinda glosses over this part.

If I'm out of threads, does that mean I'll be replacing the clutch soon?

Thanks guys!

You may be able to take up a few more threads worth at the clutch end. Have you looked there?

I've tried looking up there...but I can't quite see enough to do anything.

did you note section 5 and fig 4.9 on pages 70&71 of your haynes? ensure the 10mm protrusion on the pedal end of the cable is correct.

k

All the cables I have ever used have a spacer block between the nuts at the clutch release arm and the arm itsself. If you don't have one I would say to add one. I have made them from barrel nuts that are just large enough to fit over the threaded rod end.

Is this the first time you adjusted the clutch?

Why do you need to adjust? Does clutch engage near the bottom of the clutch pedal throw or near the top (almost released)?

Pulling the clutch arm to the rear of the car disengages the clutch (left in your pic). This pulling is done when you depress the clutch pedal. The further to the rear the clutch arm is adjusted the further to the end of the pedal the clutch engages. Ie., you have to barely press the pedal to get the clutch to disengage.

Adjusting the clutch arm to the front of the car (right in your pic) means the clutch engages more toward the bottom of the clutch pedal. Ie., you have to depress the pedal more to get the clutch to disengage.

Check where the clutch cable enters the cabin for any rust. I had rust there and was constantly adjusting the cable like yours until I realized that the firewall was rusted and the cable stop was moving toward the engine.

As my clutch wore in my red car (its gone now), I had to add some spacers (washers) to allow adjustment just like you have now.

Spoke

The clutch disengages pretty much on the floor. The firewall is solid and is not rusted at all. The clutch works fine now, but if the pedal is not ALL THE WAY to the floor, it doesnt disengage. I test this by putting it in 3rd with the clutch pushed in all the way, to stop the gears spinning, then I'll try to put it in reverse and the gears grind, even though i didnt let the clutch out. I put a new rennline pedal board in and the clutch stop is all the way at the top of the adjustment and is not interfering in the clutch travel. This is an ounce of prevention kind of question basically.

Hey Purple.

Have you looked to see it the clutch tube has broken at the front attachment? All the other suggestions are correct but I think if this tube has broken loose, then some range of travel is lost.

As far as I can tell, the tube is right where it's supposed to be, I cant move it around at all (when I had the shifter out)

Sounds like its time to add some spacers between the arm and the nuts. You might also want to check the connection of the clutch cable to the clutch pedal assembly. Theres a threaded end with securing nut.

Here's a pic of my clutch adjustment. The clutch is new.

That's a great pic spoke.

The end of the cable has a TON of thread space on yours, I wonder if I looked wrong at mine and I actually have more threads than I think...

It really does look like my arm thing is all the way at the back of the threads by that shinier part though. What kind of thing should I use for a spacer? Can I get this thing at lowe's... can i get it stainless? Everything I touch in this car gets converted to stainless.... I have to make sure I dont touch the headers/HE's

Was this a problem before you put the new floorboard in?

good call sww...

No, it wasnt.

Call me lame, but I like the look and the feel with the floorboard in. I may just take the stopper out though. I just dont like being able to tread on the wiring harness of the car.

It's a clue as to why the pedal board was gone off the car in the first place though, dontcha think?

I ran into a similar situation years ago with a friend's 914. We added spacers under the adjusting nut which allowed limited clutch functioning. Took the cable off and found the fork adrift signaling a need to pull the transmission to replace the fork cup. We found that the plastic cup in the clutch fork (pivot point) had crushed beyond effectiveness requiring tighting up of the clutch cable beyond the limits of the thread. Did the trick for his problem, not sure if it matches your's.

Anyone else run into this?

Pulled the pedal plate at lunch and found shifting to be quite a bit easier as far as grinding is concerned. It didnt look like it was interfering, but I guess it was somehow.

How large should the inner diameter of this spacer be?

Thanks guys

Just large enough to slide over the threads of the cable end...

You may have it figured out already, but did you check the cable end at the pedal connection? There is a couple of inches of threaded adjustment available at that end. In my case I once connected the cable at the end of the threads at the pedals and resulting cable length was too long to allow adjustment at the clutch arm. So it was back into the pedal connection, which I hate, to shorten the cable. I found that adjusting it to about 1/2 the threaded portion worked fine. I didn't want to fix it by adding spacers at the clutch arm.

I hate to sound like a n00b, but how the hell do you get at the connector at the pedal end? I have a wierd car in that the P.O. bedlinered the interior and all the service covers are bedlinered down. Do you hold down the clutch pedal to get to the adjustment at the clevis? Do you have to disconnect the clevis to adjust it? I've gotten bruised ribs from working in that area already, are you saying I get to bruise them some more?

All good responses above. However, the first thing you should check is the angle of the throwout bearing arm. Make sure the arm is angled slightly forward. It's common for the pivot point ball and cup to wear allowing the arm to move rearwards and causing you to have to tighten the cable nut to get the slack out.

The problem is that when that happens it messes all the proper angles up and the clutch won't work properly. If that's the case, you may have to pull lthe tranny to replace parts and add shims under the pivot ball.

The object is to have the arm at 90 deg to the pivot ball at half it's travel.......

Here is the angle that the arm should be at.....

Click to view attachment

NOT to beat a dead horse but also check that the place where the clutch cable EXITS the firewall (under the car) is not dimpled in...that should be a nice FLAT piece of metal...mine didn't show signs of being broken either before I looked there and it had pull inside the car....

Josh

to check the pedal end of the cable, pull up the carpet covering the tunnel. there is a small cover plate on the forward end of the tunnel. remove that and you can see the connection. lots of good sugestions and places to investigate. start with the simplest.

k

That cover, along with all the other access covers in my center tunnel, has been bedlinered down. It's a serious pain in the ass to have a car's interior done with bedlinder, but mine has it. The upside is that I can throw wrenches around in there with wreckless abandon and they make a cool rubbery bouncy noise

you're going to have to remove the cover to replace the clutch cable. do the one at the rear of the tunnel too. no time like the present to get a couple of hassles out of the way.

k

The one at the rear of the tunnel lets me fiddle with the firewall shift bushing, yeah? I have a complete bushing set I havent put on yet because of this issue.

Check the Socket which the Clutch fork Ball pivots in. These are made of injection molded plastic, and are not solid. Over time, they break down and collapse. The pivot for the fork moves so you will never get enough ajustment in the cable until you replace it. I machined one out of self-lubricated bearing bronze which I believe will last several lifetimes. I spent many hours trying to debug this one and it was very frustrating. That was my motivation to machine an "overkill" solution rather than simply ordering a new one for a few bucks from Porsche.


See item #5 in the attached photo.

everything mentioned is important. don't piece meal it. the individual shipping is a killer. if the p.o. didn't perfom the services or didn't know, consider them all needing to be done. the shift bushings and the items for the throw arm pivot. when you're ordering parts inquire about the 2 plastic bushings that cradle the ball on the shift lever and include them in the order. the cable could be stretched, the clutch cable end could be spent. while you're in there, replace item #1 pictured above.

you need to network a bit with your fellow texans. there's a wealth of knowledge down there.

k

I think for now i'm going to deal with the pedal to the floor nonsense and when i've got enough, drop the whole thng out of the car and put a new clutch in, TOB, pressure plate, flywheel, all the little itsy bits that are busteded and so on.

There is so much that was just let go by the P.O. it's sad. he fused a link off like the stereo fuse on the fuse panel to run the fuel pump....

put motorcycle exhaust on it

bedlinered the interior

the steering column has up/down play

jury-rigged a BRB starter (big red button), necessitating running FOUR thick wires

put the temp sender wire into the wiring harness, and then didnt pull it out in the engine bay...

the left front suspension is loose and i can hear it banging around

it's quite possibly a bus engine in my car

WITH hydraulic lifters

with missing left side cylinder ducting off the engine tin

and the coup de grace....


weber progressive

the list goes on.

I found on mine that the plastic cup was worn through and the ball had ground a deep spot in the shifter fork. This means that the new plastic cup would no longer have proper support below. This will cause the new one to wear out or break much sooner. Make sure the bottom of the hole in the shift fork is flat.

Well guys, an update to what looks to be the beginning of a saga....

It turns out my wedge is metal, and the cable already has 2 washers as spacers in front of the wedge.

I got the front cover plate up and am in the process of replacing my pedal cluster. turns out it looks like i've got a good inch of threads to play with at the clevis...i drew a picture to make sure that's what it means.

Does it look like i've got some wiggle room now?

Once the clevis ball holder part is fully threaded on to the clutch cable, I believe some threads remain. You may not have much, if any, to work with at the pedal end of the cable. Removing and inspecting the transaxle for clutch wear is a fun and rewarding weekend project. Gather your tools, get a pal to help (i did it solo), research here and get the Haynes manual for torque specs, and go for it.