Clutch pedal goes down but needs a lot of force

[xirdneh]

my friends tercel has a clutch problem
for some reason the pedal takes a lot of force to get it to the floor
about 2 months ago her clutch cable broke and someone installed a new one
abt three weeks ago it began to take more and more effort to get the pedal down
i finally had a chance to look at it today
the cable is brand new
the arm at the bell housing that it attaches to is straight up which is where it should be
but when i try to move the arm back towards the firewall it only moves abt a quarter of an inch (my car moves abt 1 inch)
when i wiggle the cable where it is exposed between arm and engine block the cable is tight (my car is not tight)
i am thinking the new cable is binding (hopefully thats it)
the only other thing i can think of the shaft for the clutch arm is binding where it goes into the bell housing
anyone out there ever have a problem like this?
will be removing clutch cable tomorrow afternoon

[rer233]

Had similar symptoms years ago with my '84 SR5. Turned out to be the clutch release arm pivot binding in the bellhousing (clutch also tended to slip- esp when cold.) Had to pull the tranny to lube the pivot- really ticked me off since the clutch was only a couple years old. Ever since then, i make sure it's well- lubed whenever i have a tranny out.

Hope you don't have a similar experience.

[marlinh]

Yeah, it really sounds like it is an internal problem. That's probably why the first cable broke.

[dlb]

when i replaced the clutch in my wife's civic, there were important notes about cleaning and re-greasing certain pivot points, like at the arm at the clutch slave cylinder. i would guess there is a buildup or corrosion or old, glue-like grease there.

[xirdneh]

removed new cable and it moved freely
moved clutch arm cable attaches to and it moved freely too (abt 1-1.5")
now I am thinking it has to be pressure plate
pedal goes down hard and halfway something give then continues to floor hard

tried google search but found next to nothing about pressure plate causing this
one guy found the new cable was pinching itself and re-installed the old cable

probably should replace new cable just in case
before yanking tranny/transaxle

[Petros]

sounds like a pressure plate issue, how old is it? could be a bad cable, but I know sometimes when the pressre plate assembly starts to come apart broken bits get caught in places that cause it to bind up. likely it is just a matter of time before it completely bundles up.

[Highlander]

My '83 had high pedal pressure before I changed engine and clutch out - I found that the throw out bearing carrier had lots of old sticky grease where it is supposed to glide over the input shaft tube that was increasing the sliding friction. Since then, everytime that I change out a clutch or engine, I clean the tube and inside of the carrier and regrease it lightly.
I know this isn't what you wanted to hear, but thought that I'd chime in

[jimcrazy]

my 88 had the same kind of problem got it apart and the clutch plate did not have springs in it instead it had rubber pucks about 1 1/4" in dia and about 3/4 thick, one of those got out and was bouncing around between the disk and pressure plate jamming up the fingers when you pushed the clutch in

[xirdneh]

my brother installed a clutch kit and that fixed the problem
when i get a chance i will look at the old parts and find out what he thought the problem was