2003 Manual Hydraulic Clutch Fluid

This may be one of this "yeah everyone knows about that" questions but when it was happening I couldn't find any answers.

I began experiencing some rough shifting issues and was dreading TX problems, long story short, I popped the hood and the hydraulic clutch fluid was so low it **may** have gotten air in the line (facepalm #647, felt pretty stupid.) I just never thought to check it, the master and slave are 3 years old, and there are no leaks anywhere.

So the question is, where the heck did the fluid go? It was topped off when I replaced it, working fine for 3 years or so. As mentioned no leaks, the clutch works fine once I re-bled it and the level is staying topped off (with the lesson learned to actually look at it once in a while.)

What I did notice though was when I bled the hydraulics the fluid was full black, no transparency to it at all, which was puzzling and a bit of a concern. Does DOT 3 compress somehow in a clutch system? I don't know, where did the fluid go?

 

Let's just say brake fluid don't get burned off like engine oil. The fluid don't just disappear over time. It leaked out.

 

A very slight leak over 3 years?

Quite possible Internal leaks!

The boot on the slave cylinder is full of fluid ?

The rubber hose is swollen ?

Every time I open the Hood I check the Master Cylinder fluid levels.

You never opened the hood in 3 years?

 

LOL no lots of times, new PS pump, radiator, tune ups . . . it never occurred to look at the clutch fluid, as I said, "doh."

Where though? Dry as a bone everywhere, not even any signs of seepage. Been a few weeks since I bled it, level isn't dropping.

 

About five years ago while I was at a hunting camp my clutch started acting up. Checked the fluid and it was very low. Topped it off, bled it, and it has been working fine ever since. The thing is I have always checked it regularly. There were no leaks, and I haven’t had to add any since. The only thing I figured could have happened is it somehow got air in the system and burped a bunch of fluid out the top of the reservoir. It wasn’t a gradual drop in the level over time. It was a lot in a short period of time, and had never happened before that, or since.

 

Right @Gyrkin , any time I change something I check in on it a couple times after the repair, and it was fine when I changed it. You keep checking something and after a while it seems like a futile action because nothing appears to be changing. A whole cylinder full of fluid should show at least a slow leak somewhere, but not seeing anything. <stuff that keeps me up at night>