Well I was driving home tonight, it was fine for a mile or two, then I started to notice a slight vibration, but I didn't think much of it.. After a few seconds I heard a terrible grinding noise and there was no acceleration (as if I had depressed the clutch pedal, but I didn't). I was able to get it home though. As long as I didn't give too much gas it was fine. But "too much gas" in this case was like the lightest acceleration you can imagine.. I'm probably lucky I didn't have to do a full stop.

Any ideas? I need to get it fixed, this is my daily driver

This is a 97 dakota 4cylinder 2wd manual.

 

How many miles on the clutch? They usually don't go out all at once! Did this happen at cruising speed, or while acclerating, or while deaccelerating? Did you have the clutch pedal depressed or had you just released it?

 

i ran my 98 stock V6 clutch bolted to a 5.2 til the very end of that clutch's life heh. Never seen or heard of anything like that happening because of a clutch but theres a first time for everything i suppose

 

Well, when it first happened, it was at a cruising speed, maybe I was accelerating a little, but I wasn't mashing the gas or anything..

Could this be a problem with the clutch hydraulic system? I did have a problem with it before, once it somehow must've gotten air in the line and the clutch was dragging, but I fixed that before I did any real driving. And the pedal does squeak... Could this be the opposite? Clutch not fully engaged? Just a thought though, I dont really know how clutches work besides a disc or two and some friction..

 

I've never heard of a clutch not engaging because of a hydraulic problem... those problems usually cause disengagement problems. I think there is actually something physically broken... as in the clutch disc seperated from the hub or something. I hate to say it but I think you're going to have to pull the transmission to find the problem.

The reason I asked if you had just released the clutch pedal is because part of the hub (like a spring or something... yes there are springs on a clutch disc) could have lodged between the clutch and pressure plate or clutch and flywheel while you had the clutch dissengaged and it is stopping them from making contact. But it doesn't sound like that based on what you've said.

 

Heh, not exactly what I wanted to hear, but I didn't have my hopes up :P

I guess it's good that this happened now at the end of my school semester, I got like a month to get this thing fixed before I have more classes..

 

Bearing in the tranny possibly?

 

sounds more like an inner tranny problem to me, but yes, pull the tranny off and have a look see

 

I think there was some judder in the clutch before this problem started. Only happened on takeoff and after I had been driving for a couple of miles...

I went to test drive my truck some today.. I think I could idle it in gear in all gears if I gave it too much gas, and idle in 2-5 by just letting the clutch out...

I could still drive it veeery lightly however, speeds under ~25...

And I will be pulling the trans out to get a closer look asap.

 

i bet the clutch is toast. hope you didn't get into the fly wheel and have to have it machined.