Hi,
I really am not having a good car week!
After my 306 died i now have to survive til saturday using my mums N Reg 1.1 Fiesta, but i discovered on monday evening the clutch is now slipping, even tho the car has only done 25000 miles!
I can make it slip by flooring it at 20 in third, and 4th and 5th gears are difficult to accelerate in at all.
Three questions - Is this the clutch itself going, or possibly another component such as the cable?
How long will it last like this before it is undrivable? It's doing 250 miles of mixed motorway and town driving this week
What is the best technique for driving a car with a slipping clutch? The way ive found best is to use lower gears than usual, keeping the revs up, which seems to stop the clutch slipping so badly when i accelerate(gently!).
|
|
Replace asap - otherwise as the clutch will wear down the rivets will bite chunks out of the flywheel, which will in turn dramatically increase replacement costs.
|
|
|
Hawesy,
Just have a check at the gearbox end of the cable to make sure it is allowing the clutch lever to fully release. If that looks OK then it seems your Mum will need a new clutch very soon.
If it is hard to accelerate at all in 4th and 5th then the car is near unuseable isn't it.
They will often get rapidly worse from this point on. Had to change one on a Xantia recently where it had gone from slipping a bit when the turbo pulled in 5th to almost impossible to move at all...in just 200 miles.
When I collected it I struggled to get it 3 miles home in any gear, even moving off in first was like an old auto-drive moped.
Beware damaging the flywheel by driving it too long like this.
Yes you last point about how to use it if you must is correct.
M.M
|
|
Thanks guys, i'll check the cable at lunchtime. It needs to survive 125 more miles, otherwise i'll be pulling a sicky thursday and friday due to not having a car to get from Watford to Slough in and there isnt really any other viable transport option.
|
Fiesta clutch is pretty simple to replace plus the parts are cheap.
Enjoy the sickies :-(
--
groups.msn.com/honestjohn - Pictures say a thousand words.....
|
|
|
|
|
with a clutch slipping as you describe then I would suggest it is already well past the point at which it should have been changed.
|
|
The car doesnt get used much under normal circumstances, and when it is my mum is the one using it, and i'm confident she wouldn't even notice it in its present state! Isn't it a little early tho, 25000 miles?
|
The biggest risk is to yourself.
When you need some wellie to get out of trouble or for example joining a roundabout there is a risk of being shunted from behind because you are expected to get on with it.
The second biggest risk as previously stated is scoring the flywheel.
|
Thanks for your concern, Henry, i appreciate that this could be a problem, but at the moment there's very little slip in first and second, but coaxing fourth gear above 60 takes a long time! Bear in mind that this is a 1.1 Fiesta with 44bhp and a top speed as quoted in the manual of 88mph, so its not exactly a rocket anyway!
75 miles to go......
|
|
|
|
