legacycentral bbs

I am having problems with a hydraulic clutch, I put a rebuilt engine and new clutch with a PDM clutch sleeve repair kit in my friends car,I'm not sure what the clutch felt like before but my friend said it was "acting weird" in her words which is partly why I decided to replace the clutch, after I put everything back together the clutch pedal wouldn't return from the floor sometimes and she occasionally had a hard time getting it into gear. I thought the clutch master or slave cylinder must be going out so I rebuilt the master cylinder and installed a rebuilt slave cylinder, but now the pedal just goes to the floor and it won't go into gear at all, I know I put the clutch / flywheel on properly but I've never worked with a hydraulic clutch before and I'm not sure if I missed something maybe in the bleeding process or something, I don't know, any tips or suggestions would be great I'm out of ideas . thanks!!!!

I had the same problem just last week. Turned out the release bearing wasn't seating in the pressure plate. It would go in but come right back out. It's gotta stick in there and stay in there. After I messed with it a bit I got it to stick in and stay in and the clutch works great now.

May not be your problem but it's worth looking into. Pull the boot off the fork and look down in the hole to see if the release bearing is staying in the pressure plate when you move the fork back and forth. Might have to unbolt the slave cylinder to get it out of the way.

I'm confused the release bearing has clips to attach it to the fork, how is it supposed to stick into the pressure plate?

There's a metal ring that's made up of two pieces. It comes with the clutch kit and it should already be in the pressure plate. I don't think it comes out. The release bearing will snap into that ring and stay there. That's how the pedal returns after you push it in. If it doesn't seat in there and stay connected the pedal won't return and the clutch will not work.

Just for clarification, what subaru model and year is this that you are working on?

I'm sorry its a 99 outback.

Which would make it a push type with the clip on release bearing

Does anybody have any experience bleeding a 99 hydraulic clutch? Its only got one air bleeder zerk on it, no clutch damper which should make it easy but I think I'm missing something. thanks

Well My wife found a tsb about this problem that includes this year and it says to replace the slave cylinder and clutch hose along with two gaskets, I don't know how to link things but you can find it on scooby mods,TSB's among other places.