Little to no Clutch

Been working on another F150. This one has the 300 6 cyl with the manual OD trans. Once I got the truck running well enough to attempt a drive I noticed the hydraulic clutch would engage / disengage right on the floor. There is no adjustment. Checked the master and slave cylinders. Master is fine slave was leaking pretty bad so I replaced it and bled it out very well. No change. Will I have to do a change out of the complete clutch set and turn the flywheel?

 

Either there is still an air pocket in the master, or the master is pooched. We used to see this all the time when I was wrenching at the Ford dealer. You can try depressing the clutch pedal and sliding your foot off the side of it so the pedal snaps back, sometimes that will "burp" the master. It may take a few tries. Ford used to sell the master with the hose as a pre-bled unit, just plug it into the slave, bleed a couple times and presto. Try the burp trick first.

 

Interesting, I just replaced my clutch, pressure plate and through out bearing with internal slave. The slave/bearing had been replaced once before. My peddle was at the top, to engage before replacement, truck has 212K on it. After replacement peddle was almost at the floor to engage. After driving a few weeks it is back off the floor like it should be. I replaced the bearing and slave, because it would leak in very cold weather. I too me and a friend about 12 hours to do the complete job. Rusty old truck, and the slave line was a bitch. The flat rate book said 4 hours for the job. Well I am old and this isa 4X4, need to split the transfer case and remove and then move trans back. Used 2 trans jacks. A hoist would have been a life saver, to old for the up and down. Thanks Bill.

 

Would that be done with the master lid on or off? Another thing I noticed that after I would crack the bleeder on the slave the peddle would stay on the floor until I pulled it up and then felt normal again. This truck sat over 15 yrs. Every part of the brake system - lines and power booster had to be replaced.

 

If your slave cylinder is mounted outside the bell housing,remove it from bell housing and reverse bleed it by pushing the rod in slowly several times.

 

What year F150? And how many miles on it?
Back in my early Ford parts manager days there was a little known TSB to solve a problem somewhat like this.

From memory, early/mid 80's F150 through F350's with over so many miles the firewall in the area of the clutch pedal would flex so much it would cause this.
There was a firewall re-enforcement kit that Ford supplied that fixed this.
You should be able to visually see the flex from the engine compartment with someone else depressing the clutch pedal.

 

Shouldn't matter if the lid is on or off. Having to manually lift the pedal after opening the bleeder is normal. Sometimes just pumping the crap out of the pedal (don't open the bleeder) and letting it sit overnight will work.


IIRC, the firewall re-enforcement kit was for the cable operated ones, wasn't it? Something to check though, I remember installing those kits.

 

I bench bled it before install. Nearly 100% pos theres no air. The truck is an 85 with under 80K on it. It will be for sale very soon if anyone is looking for a rust free base model long bed truck.

 

Ended up installing a new master today. Bled it out and there was no change in operation. There's an adjustable rod that goes over a pin on the lever that pushes when the peddle is depressed. Turned that out about 10 turns = maybe 1/4 inch travel. Fought like heck trying to get it back on the pin. Now the clutch will engage/ disengage about 3" off the floor. I can live with it. On the test drive the engine quit at the end of the driveway. Found (new) fuel filter clogged. Dropped the tank. full of crap + a hole in the top. Sending unit and pick up is trashed also. Betting there's plenty of trash in the rebuilt carb now too. Never ending on this one.

 

But hey - the clutch issue is solved, right? :laugh: