In the saga of clutch death, A.B. Bonds wrote:
>The way I see it (assuming your throwout bearing is good) you have two
>possibilities. (1) The push pin or the clevis is excessively worn.
>This is the pin between the clutch fork and the slave piston, and the
>clevis is the little dingus that connects it to the piston. The hole
>in the pin should be round and a reasonably tight fit with the clevis.
>The clevis should be perfectly round. Replacing either or both of
>these can be done with tranny in car and is inexpensive. (2) The bad
>news, but this is what usually happens. The fork pivot bushing is
>worn out. This is manifested by lateral sloppiness in the fork arm,
>which can be tested by wiggling the fork back and forth sideways.
>There is usually some slop, but not a lot (say 1/8" or so). If there
>is more, you need a new bushing in the fork. This requires removal of
>the engine, though the tranny can stay in the car. I usually prefer
>to take both out as a unit and split them outside the car, but YMMV.
>
> Good luck!
> A. B. Bonds
The push pin does wear out in time. I know this because I had this problem
about ten years ago. Back in those days, living in rural Wyoming, I could
not buy the fork separately so I replaced the entire clutch master
cylinder.
The fork bushings or the pressure plate seem like possiblities (Graham
Mccann's suggestion; the release bearing is one year old, the clutch disc
was replaced ten years ago, and the pressure plate was old even then). But
that means removal - perhaps the height of excitement in MG mechanics.
In a related note, an old MG mechanic showed me an unusual trick some ten
years ago. By drilling a hole in the transmission bell housing of a
diameter of over an inch (25 cm), one can access the pressure plate bolts,
undo them, and pull the transmission out without removing the engine. Or in
my case, separate the engine and transmission to get to the clutch.
However with my OD transmission, I found it such a tight fit that its just
as easy to pull the engine forward enough to remove the transmission.
Looks like a fun weekend ahead.
One other note to A.B. - your calender is off. Your email messages are
dated four days earlier than the present.
David Councill
dcouncil@imt.net
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