From time to time, every few weeks to a few months, the clutch hydraulic system loses pressure. When this happens, the clutch does not fully disengage, the car will creep even with the clutch full to the floor, and the gear select will be stuck in whatever gear it happens to be in. Shutting the engine off and pumping the clutch a few times fixes it and then it's perfect again for weeks or even months.
I've owned nothing but manual shift cars my entire driving life (40+ years, 30+ cars) and normally this would indicate a bad master or slave cylinder, but those issues would not fix themselves and would only get worse with time. This problem has persisted for several years without significant change.
My personal theory is that it has something to do with the hill-holder, which interconnects the hydraulic systems of the brakes and the clutch. I suspect it sometimes allows some fluid and/or pressure to bleed off in the wrong direction thus requiring the pump-up to restore it.
I have brought this to two different dealers, but of course it works perfectly when they look at it and their only suggestion is to let it fail completely. So far, it has not failed completely, and the problem persists. The dealers swear to me that they've never heard of this problem in any other Honda, but I doubt it.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
From time to time, every few weeks to a few months, the clutch hydraulic system loses pressure. When this happens, the clutch does not fully disengage, the car will creep even with the clutch full to the floor, and the gear select will be stuck in whatever gear it happens to be in. Shutting the engine off and pumping the clutch a few times fixes it and then it's perfect again for weeks or even months.
I've owned nothing but manual shift cars my entire driving life (40+ years, 30+ cars) and normally this would indicate a bad master or slave cylinder, but those issues would not fix themselves and would only get worse with time. This problem has persisted for several years without significant change.
My personal theory is that it has something to do with the hill-holder, which interconnects the hydraulic systems of the brakes and the clutch. I suspect it sometimes allows some fluid and/or pressure to bleed off in the wrong direction thus requiring the pump-up to restore it.
I have brought this to two different dealers, but of course it works perfectly when they look at it and their only suggestion is to let it fail completely. So far, it has not failed completely, and the problem persists. The dealers swear to me that they've never heard of this problem in any other Honda, but I doubt it.
- rallyr, Pen Argyl, US