Car won't shift into gear (manual)

Maintenance/Repairs
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1

My car won’t shift into gear when turned on. Clutch does not feel any looser then normal and there seems to be pressure in the lines. Just replaced my head gasket but not sure how that would affect clutch. Any ideas?

2

The clutch master cylinder is probably leaking internally.

When this happens, you can shift thru the gears as long as the engine isn’t running

Start the engine, and the gears grind even with the clutch pedal is depressed.

Tester

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3

How about the slave cylinder on the one’s I have had over the year’s it seemed to be the slave started leaking first.

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4

For this car the slave cylinder is inside the transmission bell housing. I was looking online and a guy with a similar car found that his clutch had rusted to the flywheel. Is this possible?

5

I believe most car’s have the slave cylinder’s inside the belll housing as far as the clutch being rusted to flywheel I supose it’s possible but I have never seen one do that.

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6

The suggestions you have received are good ones

The only thing missing is the why…

When a slave or master is not working 100% what occurs is that the clutch does not come fully uncoupled from the flywheel… it drags just slightly… which turns the input shaft in the transmission… which prevents you from going into gear at a stop.

Shut the engine off… and it immediately shifts into gear… proving this theory

The only thing you need to suss out is if your clutch dragging issue is caused by the master… or the slave

In your case you hope its the master as that is the only easily accessible component between the two…

So begin there and see what u get… if it fixes it great… if not… your transmission is coming out… all just to address the slave

Enjoying those “located on the input shaft” clutch slaves? Yea me too… i feel your pain, believe me

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7

The OP didn’t mention any leaks.

So it has to be master cylinder.

Tester

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8

Yeah the fluid lvl did not seen to drop and even after pumping and bleeding the clutch no air came out.

9

That sounds like good news for you… if the master is leaking internally… i.e the seal on the internal pushrod inside the master can leak pressurized fluid round the bore edges and back into the master itself… no leak

That is possible.

If you do replace the master… DO NOT SKIP the bench bleeding process. It is not optional.

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