Dear Mike:
A stuck clutch can spoil your whole day. The problem stems from the clutch
disk sticking to the flywheel or pressure plate. There are a few things you
can try before doing anything drastic like pulling the engine/trans.
1) Place the transmission in 4th gear, press the clutch and hit the starter.
Be sure that the car is situated such that you won't hit anything if it
should lurch forward. And set the hand brake.
2) If 1 didn't work try 2. Gets some friends to rock the car back and forth
with the engine off, trans in 4th gear and the clutch pedal depressed. If no
luck goto 3.
3) With the help of friends get the car moving on a deserted road and match
engine/road speeds such that you can engage a gear. Do not force the shift
lever the syncros will allow the gear to engage when the speeds are right.
Push in the clutch pedal and accelerate hard.
4) A friend of mine had this problem on his Mark II Jag and steps 1 to 3 did
not work. It looked like we would have to pull the engine (and pulling the
engine on a Mark II makes pulling the engine on a triumph a picnic). In
desperation he opened the hole at the bottom of the bell housing (the hole
that drains the oil that leaks past the rear main seal) and, with a friend
pushing down on the clutch pedal, he worked the disk loose by pushing a
mechanic's scale (small steel ruler) between the flywheel and the disk. IT
WORKED!
If none of the above work (and bear in mind that #4 involves a modifcation to
the housing) pull the engine/transmission and resurface the flywheel and
replace the clutch.
Lets hope that #1 or #2 work.
Dave
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