Clutch engages right at the floor, all new parts though

[4ged4G63]

I know, another clutch adjustment/clutch fork/pivot ball/to shim or not to shim thread.

Some info. Rebuilt trans by sheptrans, installed and third gear was difficult to egage/disengage, first gear slightly notchy so I started going through the old system to rebuild it.

Pretty much have rebuilt the entire hydraulic clutch ststem. New act 2600/street disk and act flywheel, new oem master and slave cylinders, new oem pivot ball, new comp clutch forged fork, new oem t-bearing and clip.

My pedal returns to normal position, when I grab the pedal and pull up on it there is no slop, it's solid.

My new slave cylinder has a gold/yellow cylinder inside. I have heard of the red and green but never gold.

After putting everything back together the clutch engaged right off the floor.

So I pulled trans and added a shim/washer. Now in first gear I get the drag, car moves forward slightly in first gear at around 5500 rpm. So bled the system and now it doesnt move forward during rev test but still engages right off the floor.

What am I doing wrong? I'm pulling the trans and removing the shim or at least finding a thinner washer. This is ridickulous. People insist to not shim but then others do and feel their problem has been solved.

With all new parts I shouldn't need a shim.

Sorry for the long post.

 

[JusMX141]

Make sure you're using the correct slave cylinder per application (AWD vs. FWD).

I just went through the same thing on a buddy's 1G that he purchased last year- the previous owner replaced everything but used the wrong slave cylinder- the giveaway being the metal clutch line from the bracket to the slave had been visually manipulated. Clutch action was horrible. We put a new AWD slave (MD733623) on his car and replaced the metal line from the bracket to the slave, and his clutch action was perfect.


As we all know, FWD's have a larger bell housing which places the fork pivot at a slightly different location. All of these models use the same master cylinder which expels the same amount of fluid every time you depress the pedal, so Mitsubishi controls the amount of movement at the slave cylinder by making the FWD slave slightly larger in diameter because the FWD clutch fork doesn't have to move as far to disengage the clutch. The bore on the AWD slave is 3/4" while the bore on the FWD slave is 13/16".

If you use the larger diameter FWD slave cylinder on an AWD car, it's not moving the fork far enough when you press down on the pedal due to the different engagement points between FWD and AWD clutches. You'll get a firm-feeling pedal that can't possibly move the clutch fork far enough despite being adjusted 100% by-the-books.

 

[4ged4G63]

Great advice, thanks. I will inspect the cylinder size as soon as I can to determine if that is a problem.

My metal clutch line has been roughed up a bit, it is a little wavy in a particular spot. No visible kinks though. That waviness is really enough to mess with actual clutch engagement? The fluid is still moving through it.

I do also have a ss clutch line.

 

[JusMX141]

It's easy to tell the difference in the slaves; this was the giveaway for me on my buddy's car. For a 1G AWD (MD733623), the bleeder and line fitting will both be on the same side:

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...while on a 1G FWD (MD733620), the bleeder and line fitting will be on opposite sides:

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In order to reach the different placement of the line fitting, the previous owner of his car had bent the shit out of the line making it easy to tell something wasn't quite right.

I suppose in a pinch you could use an AWD slave on a FWD, but should never use a FWD slave on an AWD as you run the risk of transmission damage from the decreased movement of the slave.

Note that this is only a possible issue on 1G cars- all 2G turbo DSM's use the same slave cylinder.

 

[4ged4G63]

Well after taking a week off from wrenching on the car I went out last night to the garage to poke around a bit. Seems my clutch pedal does have some play in it but it's probably thousandths of an inch. I can pull up on the pedal a little bit and it clicks or taps against some stud. The slack is literally mm's. I'm guessing that even this small amount of slack is enough to cause a problem.

So I've started on dash removal so I can remove and send out the pedal box for repair.

During my searching I found a member of another forum, also with a galant vr4, who was having clutch issues too so he went about replacing his slave and he too bought one from stm and was shipped a slave cylinder that also had the gold piston in it. I have not yet measured it but it is a 1g slave, the bleeder nipple/valve is on the same side as the line.

After the pedal box repair is done I will pull the trans and remove the shim I used, then adjust the clutch per jacks trans advice, and bleed the system. Hopefully that will be the end of this fiasco.