Is the dealership screwing me? (slave cylinder)

"Bakkster, touring car driver" (Bakkster)
02/09/2015 at 08:58 • Filed to: help, repairs, clutch

tl;dr: Clutch smoked while wife's friend was driving, said the engine was surging. Dealership had to replace slave cylinder because it wouldn't bleed, could that have been the root cause (and thus under warranty)?

Long version: My wife and her friend borrowed my 2011 Cruze Eco with the MT last week for a short trip. I'd just driven the car and it was fine. Phone call a few minutes later than the car was smoking and they had shut it off and were at the parking lot of their destination.

Turns out the engine was surging (to redline without her foot on the gas) between her having trouble keeping it from stalling. She said she had to get it into 6th gear (!) to keep it from surging, on a 40MPH road. Obviously not the correct solution to the problem, but that's what happened.

After getting it to the dealer and the repair completed, fully prepared to eat the cost of the clutch repair, they called back and said they'd be delayed another few days because the slave cylinder needed to be replaced. Apparently, it wasn't part of the original repair, but when they went to bleed the system it wouldn't bleed, which immediately had me wondering if a slave cylinder issue could both prevent the system from being bled, and the clutch from fully engaging/disengaging.

I know the manual Cruze has a bit of a... !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . The big question is whether this is just an issue of a friend making a mistake (I have no hard feelings, and the last thing I want to do is make her feel bad), or if a failing slave cylinder could have caused the issue in which case I want to push the dealership that it's a warranty repair instead of a consumable.

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Help me Oppo, you're my only hope!

DISCUSSION (9)

Nibby > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 09:07

Go to dealer and do this.

Kinja'd!!!

Street Surgeon > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 09:26

When you say "surging to redline without her foot on the gas" (pardon the paraphrasing), do you mean that the car was actually revving itself to redline with no driver input? How could this be an issue at all with either the clutch or the master cylinder?

That said, if the master or slave is in bad shape I know that it can prevent the clutch from completely disengaging (at least a worn one can) but I've never heard of them preventing a clutch from fully engaging.

Bakkster, touring car driver > Street Surgeon
02/09/2015 at 09:36

That's what she said, yes. I'm not sure if she was 100% off the throttle (my wife said she had gotten rattled after stalling it and some rough shifts), or it was just her slipping the clutch. I'm waiting to hear from the dealer once they test drive it to know if they find anything (I was considering a sensor issue).

jariten1781 > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 10:12

If she was majorly slipping the clutch the whole time she could have toasted the thrust bearing which could transmit a ton of heat to the slave (same general area) killing it. I've seen one where the slave pieces looked like they were melted after someone who 'knew' how to drive a stick murdered it in a relatively short drive (turned out they had driven a manual only a couple times a few decades ago and had read up on the internet as their only refresher). The thrust bearing, in that case, had completely failed.

It takes some serious abuse to cause that but holding at redline and using 6th gear to accelerate sounds like just the ticket.

My guess is that the 'surging' was just her laying in too hard on the accelerator while letting the clutch out too slowly and she probably had pressure on the clutch the whole time. She probably just nuked the system.

Bakkster, touring car driver > jariten1781
02/09/2015 at 10:16

Sadly that's my expectation, but anything I can do to reduce her guilt I'm going to look for.

Bakkster, touring car driver > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 10:22

Anyone know how to tell the manufacture date if GM put an 'X' in the month character of the VIN?

jariten1781 > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 10:38

You can assuage her guilt by lying and stating that the dealer covered it. You might be able to pull-off a goodwill credit by being extremely polite, working up the chain, and acting ignorant but well meaning. Tough row to hoe though, this just screams 'failure due to abuse' from this vantage point.

Bakkster, touring car driver > jariten1781
02/09/2015 at 12:09

We've already worked through the guilt part (she felt far worse for herself than I ever wanted her to, and I know there's nothing I can say that'll make her feel less bad, so I might as well be honest).

I do agree that it's pretty clearly the abuse, I was just hoping there might be the one little thing I could hang a reasonable warranty claim on.

Street Surgeon > Bakkster, touring car driver
02/09/2015 at 13:09

X is Jantobery :)