2008 Subaru Impreza Clutch

Hi, it's Mark Bosterd. I'm here with Bernie Pawlik, Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver, B.C.,

Canada. Vancouver's best auto service experience. We're talking cars. You're doing good this

morning, Bernie? Doing very well. So, another 2008 Subaru Impreza. What was going on with

this vehicle? So, this vehicle came to us with a concern

of the clutch, and the specific concern of the owner was that he said the clutch fork

was broken, which is not an uncommon issue on Subarus. He'd had a friend look at it, and

he could see the clutch fork was broken. So, he was hoping not to replace the whole clutch

because he said it had been down at some point in the past, but the fork need to

be replaced. So, right into the shop, sure enough, it actually had the clutch slave

cylinder which actuates the clutch taken out. You could see the fork was broken.

He pulled it apart and found some interesting things of which we can look at pictures.

So, there's our first one. Yeah. So, this is the clutch fork. So, what

the fork does is it pivots on a, it's called a ball stud, and that red arrow is pointing

to the ball stud, which we should not be able to see right now because what's happened

is it's worn out. The fork has worn so badly that it's basically broken and the

ball stud sticks through the fork. And then that ball stud actually acts as a

pivot. So, the clutch release bearing is located sort of where you're moving your

in here. Yeah. And that thing, basically, when you push the clutch pedal, that piece

moves forward into the clutch pressure plate which releases the clutch so that

you can shift gears. So, with that ball stud broken, so in fact, it certainly

needed to have the clutch fork replaced. The owner was hoping not to

do the clutch because he'd said, you know, it had been done at some point

in the past, but what we found was it was actually in much worse shape than

we expected and needed to be replaced. So, there's the new fork. What you're

looking at on the right hand side is a brand new release bearing that you're

pointing to that area that was broken. Yeah. So, this basically wasn't there on

this board. It's gone and there's an internal piece sticking through. Yeah,

exactly. So, the question, of course, is, you know, how does that happen?

Well, probably, possibly whoever did the clutch job last may not have

lubricated it properly. If they hadn't, then, of course, there's metal on

metal every time you push the clutch it wore it through. What we find with

Subaru, the clutch forks often break to the right of that ball piece. It will

actually snap like that. Yeah, where you move in there. Sometimes those will

actually snap, break, which seems to be a Subaru thing, not too common on

other cars. Because what we found with the rest of the clutch is that it had

been overheated really badly and the owner had explained to me, you know, I

lent the car to a friend who had, I guess, for about a month and then he'd

driven with the person and found that the person tend to actually smoke the

clutch up pretty bad while he's driving. So, he felt like, oh, no, maybe

that was a bad mistake. Anyways, yes, make sure if you lend your car out,

your friends know how to drive a standard because it can be expensive.

What we're looking at there, the clutch disc on the right hand side, you

see that sort of bluish neon color? That shouldn't be there. That's a new

disc on the left. It's all kind of coppery, just metal. That's how it

should look. So, that's an indicator that this has been severely

overheated because that purpley kind of disco color there is not, it should be

more cool copper. Yeah, that's the color of very badly overheated metal.

Sometimes, you know, you may look at a motorcycle, you see they have like a

chrome exhaust pipes and have that kind of color to them, you know. It looks

like a cannon exhaust pipe, but not on a clutch disc. So, this is an

indication it got really hot. Like 1000 degrees possibly. I don't know, but

you know, when the clutch starts smoking, especially for a while, you

know, if you do it once, maybe it could be damaging, but if it's happened

quite a bit, that's not a good thing. And when we're looking at this

clutch, you were mentioning earlier that there's quite a bit of wear on

this, even though it almost looks not that bad. This is not full depth on

the clutch material. No, it's not actually. You know, usually when a

clutch is completely worn out, you see those round bits, those are rivets

that hold the fibrous material onto the clutch disc. And those, I mean,

most often, that fibrous material be worn right down to the rivets

and the clutch will be slipping. And this one wasn't slipping, but

you know, it was not too far away from doing that. The other indication,

if you look at the picture below it, Mark, the pressure plate, this is

the device that clamps the clutch basically together. And it's a

big disc with a spring, and it clamps the pressure plate to the flywheel.

And that spring, which is a sort of part in the middle, all those

little fingers that stick out, when the clutch is in good condition and

the disc is thick, that spring when you bolt the clutch together

will press down quite a long ways. And what we noticed when we pulled the

transmission out is the springs were sticking way out. So right away we go,

okay, this clutch is badly worn. So again, you know, overheating it

will damage the spring too. It doesn't have the same tension.

And I'm sort of thinking speculating that that may be why this fork

broke too, because maybe things got so hot. If there was lubricant in that

fork area, maybe it just got melted out. So this is another indicator of bad wear?

Yeah, this is the flywheel. Now this piece we don't replace, we have it ground.

It's a specialty piece of equipment. It's a flywheel grinder, and you basically

grind a little bit of metal off of it. You can grind them quite a few times.

They're just basically a solid chunk of metal. And we grind it so it's flat,

just like a brand new disc. Like real.

Yeah. There are some clutches. It's called a dual mass flywheel where you

can't grind it. That becomes a very expensive job. But fortunately,

on most Subaru's, they don't have those. And yeah, here we have the discs.

Kind of rare to have clutches in cars nowadays.

You know, they're not so common anymore. If you want to get a manual transmission car,

it's a hard feature to find. But a lot of people like them. Some cars actually,

you know, they feel like they're the right kind of transmission to have,

especially like a Porsche or something, you know, like a sports car like that,

where it does really feel much better to drive a car like that with a stick shift, I think.

If you're looking for service for your Subaru, if you've got clutch issues,

if you've smoked a clutch a few times, first don't. But if you have, if it's happened,

if you have a teen who figures he's a racer or whatever,

guys to see in Vancouver are Pawlik Automotive. You can reach them online at

pawlikautomotive.com. You can book your appointment right there.

Or you can phone them at 604-327-7112. You have to book ahead.

They're always busy. Pawlik Automotive in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Thanks so much for watching and listening. Thanks, Bernie.

Thank you, Mark. Thanks for listening.

Subaru Impreza

About this episode