Clutch adjustment on my 240D?
 

OK, I;m a rookie to this part of my car. How does the hydraulic clutch work? Can it be adjusted?

It has very little "peddle " left. I only have to push the peddle a small amount to engage it and sometimes it is hard to shift into reverse or it grinds as I try to go into reverse.

What to do?

dap,
There is little need to adjust a hydraulic clutch, so there is no ready provision to do so, provided it is installed correctly. It works by having a small cylinder connected to the pedal, so when you push it down, the piston in the cylinder displaces a fixed volume per unit of stroke length (edit). This volume change is forced into the slave cylinder at the clutch mechanism and pushes a piston out to activate the mechanism to release the clutch. Letting the pedal out reverses the process. As the clutch wears the system volume increases and this is made up with fluid from the brake reservoir rear compartment. This way the pedal stroke and the clutch mechanism stroke remain in the same proportion as the clutch wears, so you do not need to adjust.

You should make sure the rear part of the brake fluid reservoir is full though as that is what feeds the clutch hydraulic cylinders and if it gets air in it, or there is a leak, the performance of the clutch suffers. Air is compressible and any air upsets the pedal stroke lenfth (edit) to clutch activating mechanism response proportionality.

If there is not enough clutch left, and it is about to slip, you should get the opposite response, meaning a little inward motion of the pedal and you should completely release the clutch - no grinding as you reported. So it makes me think there is air in there, which takes most of the pedal travel to compress.

Bleeding is a bit of a problem sometimes. But you must address how the air got in there first. In my experience, once that is fixed and the reservoir is full of fluid, the unit should self bleed as you use it. I have never had a problem with air in a sealed system, only in systems with leaks. Remember, if air can get in, fluid can leak out. And the opposite. Good luck, Jim

You push to disengage and let out to engage. So which is it, lack of engagement or disengagement? Like Jim says, grinding is consistent with the clutch not disengaging. It sounds like you have a problem with air in the line, a low hydraulic level, or a failing master or slave cylinder. Also, a worn clutch would slip and so a quick push of the accelerator would yield an RPM increase, but little speed increase.

Good luck.

I had the same problem last week...
 

Crawl under the car with a Squirt Can Oil Pump bottle full of Brake Fluid with a rubber hose attached to its outlet.. Loosen the bleed valve on the slave cylinder. Attach the hose to the slave cylinder and pump some 50 squirts, seriously. Tighten up the bleed valve. 100% gaurentee this will fix the problem. Had same problem EXACT same problem last week...

Yes, I should have used the word "disengage" in my discription. No, the trans. does not slip at all.

I hope to work on it next Tue. and will try your idea.

Two questions.
1. What do you mean by a "squirt can oil pump"?
I assume anything to squirt oil will work.
2. When I crawl under the car, where is the slave cylinder and what does it look like?

thanks!

Call me at (609) 254 6255 and I will be glad to walk u through this.

A squirt can oiler is any cheap pump oiler you can find at a Hardware Store. You will also need about 2 feet of rubber hose 5/16" Inside diameter.
Fill the squirt gun with Brake Fluid.

Attach one end of ther Hose to the end of the squirt gun and attach the other end to the bleed valve on your slave cylinder.. if you are underneath your car you will note that this slave cylinder sits on the driver side of the transmission.

Use a small 8mm wrench to open the bleed valve. Start pumping like crazy. Tomorrow I will try to send u digital photos of this procedure since i will be doing it for a friend.