opake

Hey all, I just picked up a 96 Cherokee 5spd (ax-15) and it is a really great ride, exactly what i've been looking for. My problem, however, is that the clutch pedal on this truck is the stiffest pedal i've ever felt. My girl's 97 xj is about 1/3 as hard to depress, and my 89 F-250 is about 10 times easier to depress. Just wondering about this as it may be causing problems with getting my trans into gear.
At a dead stop with the pedal pushed to the floor (actually putting an indentation into the rug) this truck will not go into gear. Not first, second, third, fourth, or fifth, and only sometimes reverse. I can usually get it to find a gear if i fight with it for about 30 seconds and half the time end up feathering the clutch in 3rd to get rolling.
Once the truck is moving, it shifts very easily into any of the forward motion gears. It is only when i come to a stop that i have a problem putting the truck into gear.
The guy I bought it from says he put a new master cyl into the truck because the old unit was leaking. When i asked if he did the slave cylinder too he said he didn't remember. Shady? Yeah I guess, or the guy is a moron.
So what I'm getting at here is do you think i have a bad slave cyl? This is what a couple of guys have told me, but do you think that air in the system/bad slave would cause the hard pedal/impossible-to-shift tranny? I'm going to start by bleeding the system this weekend to see if dude didn't bleed it right when he put the new master on.

P.S: Sorry for the novel, wanted to fully describe my issue. On a side note, I know reverse can be a bastard, but in order to engage reverse i need to hold the shift lever in position against the internal gears to slow them down enough to engage. This drives me absolutely insane! Related issue maybe?
Thanks for any input!

Donnie_K

I don't think there's air in it, that would just make it spongy, and maybe make you have to pump it a couple times. Seems more like the culprit is the slave cylinder. Could be way off, but that's where i'd start.

dogkatcher

im no expert but my old 85 xj was a pain to shift sometimes, especially when driving in the hot summer in the metro (stop & go) .. even after a new slave cylinder. even broke the shifter off one day, $10 weld job fixed it

A buddy of mine said to use 2nd gear to "clear" the clutch so to say .. so it would shift right & not grind gears when shifting from a stop (esp.. reverse). seemed to work, but sometimes getting into 2nd was not that easy. would have to slip it into gear when stopping, for it to go into gear easier when moving again ... if rolling the slightest it would shift fine

my current 90 xj has the exact same deal, but not as frequent. I went thru 3 master cylinders in the 85 ... have yet for the 90 to start leaking .. knock on wood

I just figured it was a jeep thing .. clutch pedals both felt fine too

opake

Ok guys, so I replaced the slave cylinder this weekend, and if anything its worse. The old slave had the bleeder pointed down, which is wrong, so I installed the new unit with the bleed valve facing up.
Now i'm not sure if any of you are familiar with the slave cylinders sold from pep boys, advance, etc, but they're sealed units. The "bleeder" on them is a threaded hole that is sealed and allows no fluid nor air out. Both the old and new units were like this.
So I bled out the system by pumping the crap out of the pedal for about an hour, keeping the fluid topped off, and eventually got pedal back. And then some.
I'm back to square 1, or square .5 as it feels like I've moved back some. The pedal is still very very stiff and the pedal actually grabs while its pressed on the floor. I can idle up a slight incline with the clutch pedal mashed on the floor.
I'm thinking that I must need a clutch/pressure plate now. I called up aamco and of course they would rather bring it in for a diagnostic than even quote me a price on a clutch (which i can understand, they get more money this way.) The service writer at aamco said it sounds like a hydraulic problem, not a clutch problem.
So long story not so short, what do you guys think? Should I take a day off of work so that aamco can power bleed the clutch system or should I man up and buy a clutch kit and replace the pressure plate and clutch over a weekend? Thanks!!

jeepjeep90

im having the EXACT same problem on my 90 and i have no clue what it is its 110 degrees here so i dont want to lay under it anytime so its the ax-15 a top loader tranny or linkage tranny if its linkage the reason its not shifting right is someone abused it ripping on the shifter and its out of adjustment so it sticks halfway between 2 gears my T-10 was the same way but i dont know this time too hot to look

weldon

I had the same problem with mine when I replaced the tranny in my '92. My slave cylinder busted along with the old tranny. The auto parts store sold the slave cylinder or the clutch kit with slave cylinder for the same price so I opted for the whole kit, if I remember right it was a Dynex kit. All the parts, clutch disc, pressure plate seemed to match up. After installing it I got the same issues as you. Pulled the tranny back off, put the old clutch disc and pressure plate back on and it worked fine. By the way I had recently replaced the clutch disc and the pressure plate was still in good shape.

jeepjeep90

im not having any clutch issues at all other that its pretty hard to push down it disengages all the way but my tranny will stick in neutral and if i put it in reverse it goes right it then in will shift? i have no idea

BlueXJ

My MJ had a bad master cylinder and you could pump the old one all day and never get a good pedal. New one solved the problem in short order.

weldon

" I can idle up a slight incline with the clutch pedal mashed on the floor."
Same problem I had. First thing I changed was the master cylinder with no effect, now I have an extra perfectly fine one sitting in my garage. It sounds like the pressure plate is not releasing the clutch disc completely.

cmac

i have the same issue going on in my 95. replaced master and slave cylinders and when i did this it did seemed to fix the problem for about 3 weeks and now its gone back to square one. im going to bleed it again at some point tomorrow to see if that helps. im desperate at this point. my jeep also does this clunking thing that happens when im holding the clutch in like at the stop light. it clunks like the driveshaft is geting a momentary burst of power. when its in low range and it does this it actually pulls forward as it does this!

BlueXJ

Weird sounding symptoms but it has to be an early releasing of the clutch. There has to still be air in the system from somewhere. Are you sure that it has been properly bled? I use a Mity-Vac and that seems to work well.

opake

BlueXJ, could you detail how to use a mighty vac to bleed the system?

I took the truck in to Aamco today because I figured a second opinion couldn't hurt. Big mistake. I had to call them for an update on my truck, and while on the phone, the gentleman asked where to bleed the system from and how to bleed it, and was not aware that the system was sealed. I need to call them this morning to tell them not to touch my truck, just pull it out and park it.

sharphintofemo

Throwout bearing?

opake

Hey all, I fixed my clutch problem, and all it took was about 3 hours of research and 10 minutes of work! I got the truck back last night, and while looking online at another jeep forum, I came across a post that proved to be the solution. A gentleman had a very similar problem as I did, and this is his solution as it worked for me:

While all lines are still hooked up and the master cylinder cap is off, remove the slave cylinder from the outside of the transmission (2 bolts).
Point the rod end of the slave cylinder down toward the ground, and push the rod in slowly and consistently several times. (I ended up pumping it about ten times before I checked the reservoir)
On the first pump I heard the sound of air in the system moving up, and after the next round of pumping I found that the master cylinder fluid level dropped by about a half an inch!
I refilled the reservoir, pumped another ten or so times, only had to put a few drops back in, capped it off, bolted the slave back up, and Bam! Good Pedal!
The truck now easily shifts into all gears while moving or stationary, and the pedal grabs about 1.5-2" off the floor rather than on the floor. I guess the aftermarket slave cylinders are molded incorrectly to where they have a pocket of air in the upper end that can't bleed out of the line when they're parallel to the ground.
I hope that this helps anyone else having the same issues with bleeding the sealed ax-15 units when they install new slave cylinders independent of the big one piece sealed kit. Cheers, and thanks for your help and input guys!

drummerwookie

the XJs have an external slave?????????????? wha wha wha!!

i cant beleive i didnt know that.........i just replaced the slave on my YJ a couple months ago and YJs have an internal slave....so the whole tranny had to come out.....

i guess i shoulda paid more attention while ive been under the XJ for other fixes, but i just never thought to look to see if it was an external since the YJs was an internal....well, that means if it, or should i say, when it goes out, itll be an easy fix unlike the YJs.

hm

you learn something new every day

now watch, some one is going to come on telling me that the 93 XJs were the only year to not have an external slave.......and my day will be ruined