A broader post will follow shortly recapping the first 36,000 miles of ownership of this car from a maintenance and reliability perspective. That mileage marks the end of the bumper-to-bumper warranty period, so it seemed an appropriate point to stop and reflect. However, I wanted to separate this issue out into its own post to explain exactly what has gone on.
I cannot recall exactly when this issue started to make itself apparent, but I want to say it began at least 5,000 miles ago. What happened was that once the car had been driven for a while, and was warmed up, the clutch pedal would produce a creaking sound at the bottom 1/2 to 1/3 of travel. Usability-wise, there were no ill effects. The clutch still worked fine, the car still drove fine. If it wasn’t for the sound, and the slight feedback that those creaking sounds created in the pedal (similar to how you can “feel” a creaking door) you wouldn’t have known anything was going on. It’s hard to explain it, so I’ll refer you to the short video below for an example (not my clip):
I did quite a bit of research on this topic, and stumbled across this thread on the FT86 Club forums, so it turned out I was far from the first person to have this issue. Strangely, although this issue had been experienced by many, there was still some debate on the actual cause and/or point of failure. Some people claimed that this sound signified the beginnings of throw-out bearing failure, while others claimed that it was simply a lack of lubrication on the clutch fork.
Not one to want to take any chances, and only being 1,000 away from the end of my bumper-to-bumper warranty, I decided to bring my car to the dealership to have it looked at. This marks the first time my vehicle has been to anything other than a body shop – and the first time anyone other than myself has done any mechanical work on the car. Their technician did some diagnostics, and one of the service managers soon relayed the diagnosis to me: “We believe your clutch is severely worn, or potentially has a hot spot.” This was, of course, a suspicious answer because it didn’t really make any sense at all. So I asked, “How could a hot spot cause the clutch pedal to creak when the engine is shut off?” He did not have an answer for that, and disappeared again. A few minutes later I got an updated diagnosis: “He still thinks you have a hot spot, but it does seem like your throw-out bearing is also going bad.” I was told they were going to order a new throw-out bearing and clutch, and replace them both under warranty.
One week later, I returned to have the work done. They actually completed the work the same day, but I wasn’t able to pick the car up until the following morning. The mechanic who did the work told me that the clutch turned out to be just fine, if not slightly worn (to be expected considering my autocross use). In the end, they replaced the throw-out bearing, clutch, pressure plate, and the flywheel. So many new parts! The creak is indeed gone, and the clutch pedal feels lighter and smoother. I will update this post if any more issues develop surrounding this issue, but with any luck, that is the end of that! Below is the service receipt showing exactly what was done to the car.
