Hello,

I have a 2005 g35 with 70k miles on it. I was driving on friday night to my local automotive store to pick up some dot4 brake fluid for my clutch system. Well i got home and pulled it in the garage. I jacked the car up and watched the DIY video for bleeding the clutch system. So i use my syringe to pull fluid out of the clutch resivour and pour the new fluid in. So then i have my friend get into the driver seat and i lay underneat the car. I hook up a 1/4 ID vinyl tubing up to my slave cylinder bleeder valve. I tell my friend in the driver seat to pump the clutch 5 times then hold it in. He said holding to me so i cracked open the slave cylinder bleeder valve. Some air came out and a few drops of fluid came out and then i closed it real quick. I told my friend done... he then tried to pull the pedal up. He said it was stuck and i said that is normal and to pull it up by hand. He tried to pull it up but it snapped back to the floor. I told him to try pumping it 5 more times but it just kept snapping to the floor. I replaced the clutch slave cylinder as i thought this might be the issue. Still the same issue occurs. I even pulled out the master and the resevour and cleaned them out.

Any ideas would be helpful. I think it might be the master cylinder but i cant get the part til monday. Any reason why i shouldnt think its the master?



What its doing:

 

Did you have the tube on the slave bleed valve go into a container of new fluid? I never pump and then bleed. I push down on the pedal and bleed at the same time into a container of new fluid. On the up stroke anything coming into system from the bleed valve will be fluid. Two schools of thought at this stage as well. I allow the new fluid to go up into the slave cylinder at the start of the sequence and change it out a couple of times insuring that the last time the container is full of clean fluid only. Others have the fluid only flow from the top to bottom.

It sounds to me that you hydraulic locked the system. The master cyclinder is in the extended position at the time the slave is retracted. Fill a container with fluid, connect it to the slave, open bleed valve and then if necessary pull pedal up by hand. Do this a couple of times until the system operates normally.

Also I believe there is an issue with slave cylinders on the these older Infiniti models.

 

I had the same issue, and a complete flush of the clutch system fixed the problem.

 

pfarmer: i had the slave bleed into an empty bottle to contain the old fluid. I followed this diy to the tee. http://www.infinitihelp.com/diy/gcou...id_service.htm

I would agree the about the lock of the hydraulic. If you look in the service manual i cant even get fluid to where the clutch orifice is. The hardline from the master cylinder to the orifice is bone dry even after putting in new fluid and pumping the clutch. Also, With the master cylinder completely off the car... it still snaps the pedal to the floor like in my video link. On you last suggestion are you saying to hook up new fluid into the slave and go from bottom up???

I replaced the slave cylinder already this weekend and still the issue persists.


Texasscout: I wish that solution worked for me :-(

Thank you both for your help!!

 

I watch the video and I think it is flawed in the rate of the pump. The pump downward should be very slow. Also if you notice the level gets to the minimum before it is refilled. It is far too easy to suck a little air in if you allow it to get low. The idea of a fluid filled container at the bottom is that if you do what I have done then clean fluid is what will go back up in the bleed valve. The second method as suggested (which is also in the FSM) is fine as well but if the the system is under any suck when the bleed valve is open (or the pedal is allowed to move from the fully extended position) it will either suck up the dirty oil once more or pull in air. It is important that you do not have the tube go to the bottom of the container but it is also important that it is kept below the surface of the container as well.

When you replaced the slave cylinder did you replace the slave cylinder tube with a new one? If not then you may want to do that now. When your bud was pumping did you see any movement that indicated the slave was moving?

You didn't happen to do the mod with the spring removal from the pedal? If not then in reality the spring return should be enough to allow the pedal to return if the bleed was left open with the drain line below the surface of fresh fluid in the container. If not then I would back up and break open the clutch tube. It sounds like you either let the system go dry or that you may have forced something into the line and it is now plugged up. If you break open the clutch tube treat it like the bleed line with a piece of tubing into a filled container of fluid so as not to suck a lot of air up into it. If the clutch frees up the foreign object needs to be flushed out of the section of line that contains it (downstream of where you broke it open).

Basically this is my method:

With a clean container of fluid and a hose from the bleed valve located in it I will push the pedal slowly to the floor and open the bleed valve at the same time. If by yourself use a pedal pusher and open the bleed valve carefully to slowly allow the pedal to the floor. If you have a buddy I leave the bleed valve open in the fluid filled container. This allows one guy to keep track of the master reservoir and the container. After all air appears out of the system then I fill from the top and bleed out of the bottom until it flows clear closing the bleed between strokes.

What may be happening is that it is important to slowly release the pedal as well as slowly depressing it.

Now there is one other method that also is used if you just can't seem to get all the air out. That is get yourself a new oil can that has never been used for oil. One of those kinds that has a pump on it that you use to spot oil something. Fill it with fluid and connect it to the bleed tubing. Fill the tubing with fluid and then connect it to the bleed valve. Open the bleed valve and pump fluid into the system from the bottom up watching your master reservoir carefully. Suck up any dirty fluid from the top and do not overfill (bad on your paint). Repeat until clean. Now seal off the bottom and slowly pump the pedal watching your level. Trapped air should bubble out the top at this point. If you don't use a pump then any clean positive displacement pump may work such as what you may use to inject juices into a roast. Just make sure the pump and tubing is purged of air.

 

thanks for the feedback!! sorry it took me so long to reply. This information helped me alot. What did it was feeding the fluid INTO the slave cylinder and the resevoir. There was a failing part which dried up the system so it had to be flushed. Thanks for your help.... it helped me alot!!

 

One thing my Dad used to do with the old cars and I notice some are doing so now is run a hose from the slave cylinder to the master to vent air after a flush. This keeps the master full without the use of any additional fluid.

 

Thats a pretty good idea!

 

I should add that unlike what most I have seen today, my dad used to strain the fluid.

If you go this route basically he kept the hose immersed in the master at all times so as not to suck air back into the slave.

If you wanted to do this as a one man job I would see if I could get a cap for the master and then mount the tube through it so you could reuse it.

 

hmmm interesting theory. Think they make one of these already pre-made?

 

Hi,
My story starts much like this thread did when I attempted to bleed my clutch following the DIY video. However, I messed up and dried the reservoir doing it!!!! So, I tried again and no go. After going through several rounds of 5x5 (like the video) and the pedal never hardened. I then tried the opening the the bleeder while my helper pushed the pedal and closed right away. Tried a few times and the pedal got worse. Now, the pedal sticks at the bottom and snaps back up only manually. When I press it, it offers NO resistance and goes down all the way fast. In order to try and fix this, I went the reverse way. I got a big syringe, loaded it with fluid and injected from the bleeder valve on the slave. I did this several times but the pedal never got better. I'd really appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.

 

Haven't looked at the video, in fact the site has been blocked for about 4 months and this is the first day I have been able to get on board. In any case are you running a tube from the slave into a jar of fluid leaving the bleeder open on both strokes? One method some have used is to run a tube from the bleeder back into the master paying attention that the return is clean. If going this route at the end make sure you do in fact flush with clean fluid.

If you allowed the master to run completely dry it is possible that you damaged it.

Perry

 

Thanks for the quick reply. So, if I understand correctly, I should run a line full af clean fluid from the bleeder back up top to the master reservoir, open the bleeder, and pump slowly?

 

Very slowly! I haven't looked at the Infiniti master cyclinder but on others there was room to place a piece of cloth (or screen) around the return to keep any debris from the bleeder from reentering the stream.

Perry

 

Hey guys,

I'm also having a similar issue with my '06 and would appreciate any suggestions.

Last summer I started having issues with there being a soft spot at the beginning (first inch of travel) when I would push on my clutch. Then I would run into the issue of the clutch not returning all the way after about an hour of city driving (stuck right at the engaging point, which if I wanted the pedal to return all the way I would have to use my foot to bring it back up).

I didn't know what caused this so I asked a friend who is a lot more mechanically inclined than I am and he recommended that I bleed the system, because he thought there might be air in my line somewhere. So, I did just that. With his help, I bled the system, which made the soft spot much better, but I still had the issue of the clutch not returning all the way back-up after doing about an hour of city driving.

I started doing some reading through the forums to see what it might be and the general consensus seems to be a faulty master cylinder or slave cylinder. Now, since I live in southern Canada (right across from Detroit, MI), I put my car on stands in the garage for the winter and ordered a brand new master and slave cylinder to replace in the spring.

Now that the weather has been improving I decided to replace these parts. First, I bled the system and replaced the old slave cylinder. Second, I replaced the master cylinder. Once that was done, I refilled the MC reservoir and followed the service manual's bleeding instructions:

1. Fill master cylinder reservoir tank with new clutch fluid.
2. Connect a transparent vinyl hose to air bleeder.
3. Depress clutch pedal quickly and fully a few times and hold it.
4. With clutch pedal depressed, open air bleeder.
5. Close air bleeder.
6. Release clutch pedal and wait for 5 seconds.
7. Repeat steps 3 to 6 until no bubbles can be observed in brake fluid.
8. Tighten air bleeder.

After following these guidelines and going through 2 litres of DOT 3 fluid, I can only sense a little bit of pressure right at the bottom just before the pedal reaches the firewall. Now, I've tried replacing the new cylinders with the old ones because they worked prior to the change and I still can't get any more pressure to build up. I've checked the lines and I don't have any leaks anywhere, so I don't know what might be happening.

Please help me if you can.

Thanks in advance!