Nissan 370Z Forum - View Single Post

spearfish25 · 12-03-2009, 01:28 PM

I was tortured last night while on call and had to stay in the hospital. Going out to my car this morning, it was about 34F. The car had sat out all night, started up right away with no problem, but then I couldn't shift into reverse. I finally got it in reverse by going forward in 1st then going over to reverse. There was no gear grinding...the shifter just wouldn't engage the reverse gate (other gates were similarly stubborn but I got it in first). I also noticed the clutch pedal was 'sticky'. That is, depressing the clutch felt like I was trying to push my foot through wet mud and the clutch pedal was slow to come off the floor after being depressed. After a few minutes of driving, all was normal again.

My guess is this is related to the clutch fluid, which I may be changing in the very near future now. I don't know the specs of the clutch fluid Nissan uses but it has a pretty high viscosity when cold apparently. The gooey clutch will be a problem when it really gets cold here. Any thoughts?

12-03-2009, 01:28 PM	#1 (permalink)
spearfish25 A True Z Fanatic Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Naples, FL Posts: 4,117 Drives: to work Rep Power: 1856	Cold Morning, Squishy Clutch? I was tortured last night while on call and had to stay in the hospital. Going out to my car this morning, it was about 34F. The car had sat out all night, started up right away with no problem, but then I couldn't shift into reverse. I finally got it in reverse by going forward in 1st then going over to reverse. There was no gear grinding...the shifter just wouldn't engage the reverse gate (other gates were similarly stubborn but I got it in first). I also noticed the clutch pedal was 'sticky'. That is, depressing the clutch felt like I was trying to push my foot through wet mud and the clutch pedal was slow to come off the floor after being depressed. After a few minutes of driving, all was normal again. My guess is this is related to the clutch fluid, which I may be changing in the very near future now. I don't know the specs of the clutch fluid Nissan uses but it has a pretty high viscosity when cold apparently. The gooey clutch will be a problem when it really gets cold here. Any thoughts? __________________ 2013 Cadillac V-Wagon, RIP Z Last edited by spearfish25; 12-03-2009 at 01:30 PM.