Pulling away from stationary, a lot of juddering.
I tend to change gear at revs that I know you don’t need a clutch when driving anyway, so it’s difficult for me to say that it happens on all changes. Bite point isn’t on the floor which is what strikes me as odd.
Freelander 1.8.
Driving into London today on the M4 and in the roadworks at Slough went to change down gear and there didn’t seem to be any bite point at all, so hazards on and pumped the clutch pedal which I felt some pressure come back. We then had to do more miles to drop son off for National Youth Theatre auditions and then continue to a client in Ilford to do some site work while he had the auditions.
Was as nice as pie to the clutch as I could be, even in the traffic I was able to minimise the usage. Coming back from the auditions this afternoon, started driving with no clutch as I could feel it getting a degree worse on each start from stationary. Fortunately, once we hit the main A road we managed all round the M25 and M4 without a single gear change, and then came to the house the way we had worked out was going to minimise the changes. We made it home, and diagnostics time.
Once moving, it seems as if the clutch operates perfectly well, but the gearbox isn’t tight and no clutch changes are reasonably easy to do anyway, so it’s a difficult one. Bite point is a good few inches off the bottom of the pedal movement, just slips a huge amount well starting off, and hill starts really needed some revs to get moving, but needs must when that’s what you need to do to get home!
My first thought was straight away new clutch assembly, drive plate and bearings. But I’m now at odds with myself that it could just be the master cylinder, which is a doddle to replace. A new clutch, according to the RAVE cd for Freelander means removal of gearbox = not fun, but a lot of online guides to the clutch replacement state that is not needed. I won’t really know until I get under the car on Saturday.
Any thoughts?
DT.