(Now with pictures)

I know this topic has already being discussed, but I thought it would be useful for others to see some pictures of a failed clutch pedal.

I have a 1.9TDi Fabia estate which is 9 years old. It's covered 94,000 miles. Whilst driving home, I pressed the clutch pedal, heard a loud ping which resulted in the pedal staying flat to the floor. I thought the clutch cable had snapped (it has happened to me in the past when I owned a Cavalier) so knowing I couldn't really do anything at the side of the road I called out the AA. They duly attended and informed me that the Fabia has an hydraulic clutch. They diagnosed the fault to be a broken clutch pedal (which initially I thought he was joking). Only when I had a look for myself did I belive it has broken. The problem is a very weak box section that is only spot welded onto the side of the pedal. This box section applies all the load onto the clutch master cylinder push rod. After 9 years, the spot welds give way resulting in the back of the box section snapping off. The AA however have come up with a neat trick to get you home. There is a hole going through either side of the box section which is used for the clutch pedal switch. They put a bolt through these two holes. This gives you a temporary back section of the box that has snapped off for the rod to press against. They then place a nut on the end of the rod to increase it's surface area, which then can press against the bolt. Elaborate use of wire and tie wraps holes the rod in place. This enabled me to drive 60 miles home. The next day I removed the pedal and got the broken piece welded back on. This time the entire section was seam welded so hopefully it should never fail again.

Below are some before and after pictures:

Image showing broken box section

Image showing seam welded repair

Another angle of the seam welded repair

Edited 8 June, 201016 yr by Ricardo vRS

you need a url to show images...them links are where they are stored on your pc... :wonder:

How do I show / attach the images?

How do I show / attach the images?

you may need to upload the pictures to photobucket first then get the img code from there? (perhaps someone can clarify this?)

I've added the pictures now!

Edited 8 June, 201016 yr by Ricardo vRS

hi, my clutch did this, but when it happened to mine a little piece of plastic broke of and fell into my footwell.

since my mechanic fixed it my clutch has been "popping" up about an exxtra inch from were it used to be and says the clip that should be there has been bent/stretched so it doesnt stop the clutch from going further up than it should.

it eventually stops it, he says its fine to drive as ive done 6000ish miles like it, but wondering if anyone knows how to fix this? and did it happen to you?

my mechanic says id need to by a new master cylinder or something to get this clip

A guy i use to work with had this happen on his Mk4 Golf GT TDI 110.

hi, my clutch did this, but when it happened to mine a little piece of plastic broke of and fell into my footwell.

since my mechanic fixed it my clutch has been "popping" up about an exxtra inch from were it used to be and says the clip that should be there has been bent/stretched so it doesnt stop the clutch from going further up than it should.

it eventually stops it, he says its fine to drive as ive done 6000ish miles like it, but wondering if anyone knows how to fix this? and did it happen to you?

my mechanic says id need to by a new master cylinder or something to get this clip

I was lucky and my plastic bit didn't break. It's a white rectangle piece that fits inside the box section that broke. The clutch master cylinder rod fits inside it. If this plastic piece fails to click into the box section then the clutch pedal will site too high. This happened to me after I got the box section welded. A small amount of weld had crept into the area inside the box section and fouled on the plastic pieces, stopping it clicking into place. I just shaved off a bit of the plastic piece to get it to click in. If yours isn't clicking into place any more then I'd advise you get an new one. I have no idea what the part number it is, but I can't belive you can't buy it without buying the whole master cylinder. Why don't you ask at you local dealer, or phone AVS (www.vwspares.co.uk). Just a word of advise. The plastic bit has to be fitted to the master cylinder rod before putting the plastic piece into the box section of the clutch pedal. It's a right pig to fit, as it acts as a ball and socket joint for the rod. I wedged a screw driver across the mounting bracket of the clutch pedal and pressed the plastic piece onto the rod, using the screw driver to support the rod during this exercise.

that happened on my mates old ibiza! apparently its a pain in the arse to fix!! he also welded his own back up and put it back! he was also complaining a lot about the standard of the original weld, apparently it's a bit ****ty!

EDIT: apologies for double post - slow computer!

Edited 15 June, 201016 yr by Bezzy

Does this issue occur on the Fabia VRS? anybody experienced this

No offence to Skodafans but all these issues occuring on Fabias makes you think if Skodas build quality has supposedly improved what was it like before now?

If any of you have ever owned a well maintained jap car will understand where im coming from these issues are unheard of, the niggles here and there with the Skodas is just not appropriate just ridiculous expense. (Rant Over)

Below are some before and after pictures:

Image showing broken box section

Image showing seam welded repair

Another angle of the seam welded repair

Thanks for the informative thread and for going the extra mile and taking the time to put up the pictures.

Is this pedal weld point easily visible from underneath the car ? The reason I ask is that I was just charged for a clutch replacement ( 3 hours labour plus a clutch ) by a little garage but they were so cagey and defensive and confrontational when I asked a few chatty questions about the job that I'm starting to wonder if they didnt actually replace the clutch but instead found that it only required a weld onto a broken pedal as outlined above. As I say they wouldnt tolerate any discussion about it which was really strange.

Would it be easy to visually spot a brand new clutch ?

The bite point has not changed at all. I expected that to feel different if I had a clutch replacement but it feels exactly the same as the before I had my "clutch" breakdown as far as I can tell. Is that odd or normal ?

What DOES feel different is the gear stick changes are harder to make now. Not grinding noises - just harder to actually move the stick.

Am I being overly paranoid that I might not have actually had a clutch replacement. How can I check ?

Edited 3 March, 201115 yr by Bobby7

Thanks for the informative thread and for going the extra mile and taking the time to put up the pictures.

Is this pedal weld point easily visible from underneath the car ? The reason I ask is that I was just charged for a clutch replacement ( 3 hours labour plus a clutch ) by a little garage but they were so cagey and defensive and confrontational when I asked a few chatty questions about the job that I'm starting to wonder if they didnt actually replace the clutch but instead found that it only required a weld onto a broken pedal as outlined above. As I say they wouldnt tolerate any discussion about it which was really strange.

Would it be easy to visually spot a brand new clutch ?

The bite point has not changed at all. I expected that to feel different if I had a clutch replacement but it feels exactly the same as the before I had my "clutch" breakdown as far as I can tell. Is that odd or normal ?

What DOES feel different is the gear stick changes are harder to make now. Not grinding noises - just harder to actually move the stick.

Am I being overly paranoid that I might not have actually had a clutch replacement. How can I check ?

The part shown is inside the car below the drivers side parcel shelf. Regarding your suspected unchanged clutch. Only way to tell is pull out the gearbox for definite proof. However, if the clutch was changed, there would likely be 'witness' marks on gearbox to engine mounting bolts, and both inner CV joint bolts. If they show no signs of tooling marks then the clutch has most likely not been changed.

If gear changes are harder now, they may well indeed have replaced the clutch, and failed to do the auto adjustment on the gear change cables.

I've just done this weld repair to my pedal. Reassembly is the tricky bit - so I hope the following notes might be helpful to someone....

Instead of grinding the weld down so that the black plastic clip can fit over the top of the finished repair, I just included a short extension to the end plate, with a slight angle, thus providing the necessary switch contact surface. Hopefully even stronger !

The white nylon clip that goes over the push-rod, is part number 1H0721357 from a VW main dealer, and cost 89p.

Dunk the clip in boiling water to soften it before fitting, and then it takes just a good strong thumbs worth of pressure to get it onto the push-rod.

Pre-compress the over center spring in a vice before fitting, held with two small cable ties, to be 1/2 inch shorter than its uncompressed length.

Rehang the pedal in the pedal box, Hold the pedal fully up (bungy cord to the steering wheel helps) and locate the white push-rod clip, but do not push it in far enough to clip yet. Position the pre-tensioned over center spring, be sure to get both ends lined up. Then just gently depress the clutch pedal so the the white clip slides all the way into the pedal, clips, and in doing so it will capture the over center spring assembly.

Just cut the cable ties with a junior hacksaw blade, and remove with long nose pliers, and its all back together.

Takes less than 20 minutes.

Good-luck !

Nice guide thanks.  My clutch went recently - pedal snapped to the floor and a pinging piece of metal hit my leg.

 

Minus the weld, it took about an hour to do the whole job.  Putting the clip in boiling water and cable tying the spring were gems of info

 

There's no way you need a vice to compress the spring, just slide the cable ties in and pull as you compress by hand.  Capture as many spring coils as possible else it won't retain the compression.  Other than that, job's actually quite easy!

my mk3 ibiza cupra did this too before I got the fabia, so it's obviously a VAG thing!