Clutch is shot on SVT?

[stieh2000]

My dad's '99 Contour SVT with 113+ thousand miles just broke down about 2 hours ago. My little bro was driving it to a friends house, and when he downshifted for a turn, he couldn't put it back into gear, so he pulled off to the side of the road, and after a while, it was towed.

Before it was towed, we tried to restart it and put it in gear. The car would start fine in neutral, but simply would not shift into any gear. If shifted into first before starting with the clutch in, the car makes a wierd sound, almost as if something is grinding, but I can tell its not the gears that are grinding.

Recently, this has happened a couple of times, but it would always restart and get moving just fine. Also, I remember something similar happening a few years back, and I think it was the linkages then, but don't remember too well, but whatever it was, it got fixed.

The guy who towed the car said that it was the clutch, which seems plausable, but I would just like a second opinion of what is wrong. Thanks

[carlos80]

Originally Posted by stieh2000

My dad's '99 Contour SVT with 113+ thousand miles just broke down about 2 hours ago. My little bro was driving it to a friends house, and when he downshifted for a turn, he couldn't put it back into gear, so he pulled off to the side of the road, and after a while, it was towed.

Before it was towed, we tried to restart it and put it in gear. The car would start fine in neutral, but simply would not shift into any gear. If shifted into first before starting with the clutch in, the car makes a wierd sound, almost as if something is grinding, but I can tell its not the gears that are grinding.

Recently, this has happened a couple of times, but it would always restart and get moving just fine. Also, I remember something similar happening a few years back, and I think it was the linkages then, but don't remember too well, but whatever it was, it got fixed.

The guy who towed the car said that it was the clutch, which seems plausable, but I would just like a second opinion of what is wrong. Thanks

its definetely the clutch not disengaging which could be caused by a bad master cyl, slave cyl or just air or low fluid in your clutch system, when you press the clutch dores it feel hard or does the pedal just drop down? if it drops pump it, if it gets hard then, you probably have air in the system. another easy check would be to check and see if the lever which disengages the clutch moves 2 to 3 inches when you push the pedal in.
but the problem that i'm leaning towards is the springs on the clutch plate broke and are wedged between the plate and the disc which happens a lot if the car is driven hard, in other words after the first checks all you have left is to drop the trans and visually check the clutch itself

[stieh2000]

The clutch feels just fine when puched in, and the car is at a garage right now so I cant exatcly check for everything you said, but thaks for the input.