clutch master and slave cylinders
 

Right guys I know the sheddist kit is the way to go but they tend to be way to expensive for me.so my question is.what makes the o.e ones fai?l I know the brackets are rubbish and the freelander ones are a decent replacement if needed but the actual slave and mast.er do they actually completely fail spewing the fluid out everywhere or does the fluid "go off" causing the arm not to push the clutch arm in far enough so therefore can the fluid be replaced to freshen it up a bit.I know they are a bitch to bleed but it is possible.just kinda blue sky thinking here as I have a bit of a notchy gear change and the slave is obviously my first port of call so anybody else got any thoughts on this?

Personally I think the Root cause of the failures is the release arm within the gearbox, this starts to freeze up and put extra load on the hydraulics, causing them to break at the weakest point, which usually is either the bracket or the plastics of the slave itself!

Officially they are non-bleedable sealed units, unofficially I have bled loads ;)

"Notchy" gear change can also be the gear linkage being worn, either upgrade the components and re-drill the pins or use a ZR (or Ford Ka IIRC) Steering column universal joint and replace the whole gear linkage UJ... - Note, in one or two cases, the pin has started to fall out and by knocking it back in it resolved the notchyness...

Worth looking at that too!

Unlikely the box its just been put back in by Goldie with a slippy diff so slave is the most likely suspect as the release arm will have been greased as well.

Are you sure? Its unusual for any garage to remove the release arm and clean it up\grease it... Every time my box has been off I have had to request the extra work and they usually charge and extra half hours labour to do it too!

other thing to look at (as its a newly fitted box) is there is enough oil in the box, when the car is level the oil should touch the bottom of the filler hole IIRC... I've had a few boxes loose oil after they have been changed!


However in your case I would suspect the UJ as a first priority.

Check the shift linkage pin as it exits the box to the shaft, this has been known to move causing problems, I had similar and found the pin had slipped.

My slave broke, lost the front flange mounting off it and the bracket was cracked and out of shape. However the clutch arm was not stiff at all. I put this down to a few factors and all together they end in failure over a period of time. The bracket flexes too much, then the nose of the slave is under more force and not direct so it is suffering with a sideload force hence the breakage.

Na I think with Goldie doing the work all the above will have been done to be fair.

The roll pin should have a clip on it to stop it from falling out.
Number 17
http://www.rimmerbros.co.uk/Item--i-GRID003569

Mine has never had this fitted Pete, didn't know about its existence until you pointed this out before.

It makes me wonder how many were fitted in the first place, I've never had one go missing.

So no one knows then?