Crankwalk or something else ?

[Achelone]

I have '97 talon (roughly about 40K). This weekend I noticed something different. Big traffic jam in the highway, a stop-n-go situation. You can say I'm "clutch driver" ... i sit on the clutch during this kind of situations. I started noticing diffculty switching to 3rd ... i.e. need more effort to shift...feels like the clutch not engaged or shifting down to 1st when car for a rolling stop (i.e. my car won't let me shift down to 1st until car is almost stop ... I thought this is normal ?) , and when it snaps in, I can feel like metal hitting metal on my shifter. I've noticed this happening before during operating temparature. (Also this is not consistent ...later on I can shift to 3rd really smoothly, then back again, and so on) However what worried me was this ..., I also kind of felt that when I let go off the clutch pedal at one point that it didn't go all the way up, say off by inches (i.e. we all get used to where the clutch should be)... say for about 2-3 secs., then I felt it sprung back. Didn't happen again for the rest of the trip.

The big question ... is this Crankwalk ? I didn't do any hard left or right turn before this happened. I don't hear any ticking noise when stepping on the clutch.

[AWD Terror]

It sounds to me like you've worn out your clutch... your description of being a "clutch driver" sounds like you "ride" the clutch and keep it depressed when you're sitting idling in traffic. This can speed up the wear and tear on it, and eventually cause a difficulty in shifting (among other things).

When was the last time you had your tranny fluid changed? What kind do you use? Might be time to have it inspected...

[95tsiawdgst]

It also sounds like its time to run a search on slave and master cylinder.

[greenstreak]

I would say that it is probably not crankwalk. Like others have suggested it could be bad cylinders, old fluid, or just a plain worn clutch.

If you are worried about it being crankwalk measure the end play at the crank pulley to be sure.

[KuBiX_GSX]

is the ticking when the clutch is disengaged a 100% thing that u have crankwalk? also i hear that when the clutch does lose pressure, u actually have to pick it up off the floor but i just press it in again and it engages very very low

im not sure... im very confused :(

[Achelone]

Thansk folks ... that's a relief. Bringing car in to the shop tomorrow and I will have the clutch and fluids checked.

However, another thing came up. This happened 6 months ago and reappeared its ugly head again today. On my home from work, started the car and it felt like car hesistating to start ... RPM goes up and down between 400 to 800, but the car doesn't die. I stepped on the gas kind'a give it some help. Eventually it got into normal idle RPM. But soon after I noticed the Engine Warning Light is now on. Car runs perfectly fine on my way from work to home. Drove it again tonight to friends place and no problem, except the annoying Engine Warning Light. Same symptoms 6 months ago, chrysler couldn't get any code out then ... they said its undefined code. After a several visits, a cleaning of the throttle body (port cleaning and reset of min. idle air flow) finally got rid of it, until today. Service guy said there's a lot a carbon build up. Could this be causing 02 sensor to trigger something to the ECU causing the Engine Light ? Is carbon build up normal in the throttle body port as they described ?

[greenstreak]

Carbon build up in the throttle body is pretty common but easily cleaned on your own.

You need to find a local DSMer with a datalogger that can pull that code for you. That will make diagnosis so much easier. As far as I know there is no "undefined" code.