Hi,

I have a 1997 A4 2.8Q, 5sp. Had it for a year now. A week or so after purchase, the clutch pedal stuck when putting it into 1st to take off. When I mean stuck, I mean that it only came out about halfway, and wouldn't return all the way out even after pumping it. I pulled it out with my hand, took off and never thought about it again. Until a year later: last week.

Last week during some warm weather, (80+), the clutch pedal did the same thing again. I pulled it out again, and it worked normally. A couple of days later on another hot day, it did twice.

Today however, it is 92+ and extremley humid. On the way into town (5 miles) it stuck during almost every shift, with me having to reach down and pull it out to get it into different gears. This throroughly freaked me out, so on the return trip I took it easy, which only seemed to make the problem worse: as I was downshifting to make the turn onto my road, I pressed the pedal in and it hit the floor. To escape the truck barreling down behind me, I coasted off the side of the road onto (luckily) a flat spot where I could catch my breath and pull the pedal out by hand. After doing so, I drove it home (in 2nd gear at 10 miles an hour) and parked it.

I read some other posts of people with similar problems and there wasn't much to be found as far as a solution, only to check the "master or slave cyl." (no idea what that is...?) or that it might be a "hydrolic problem". It seems related to the heat/humidity only becuase it was perfectly fine all winter and is happening during all this hot weather.

I'm planning on taking it into the dealership for the 60,000mi mait., so I'm going to have them look at this too. Please please reply with something to tell them to look for, becuase my dealer is usually thick-skulled and they either will deny the problem or attempt to fix it without actually doing so. And for the amount I'm paying for their "superior service," I really want them to fix it and fix it right, becase not only does it annoy me, but as I found out today, not being able to shift is d-a-n-g-e-r-o-u-s! THANKS A MILLION!

 

What did the problem end up being? I've had a similar problem.. and the ,aster and slave cylinders.. are brake cylinders... huge round thing mounted on the firewall.
But what did they find, the problem isnt identical but similar in my gfs 4000CS Quatro

 

I've had roughly the same problem. ONLY happens in hot weather, depending on how hot the clutch will stick halfway down or all the way down. My dealer has looked the clutch over twice bled the line and found nothing wrong with the Master or Slave cylinder. If it wasn't for the fact that the sales associate actually saw the clutch down, they'd never believe the problem even existed! 1997 A4 1.8T

Help! Thanks,

Bill

 

did you check your clutch fluild? if is low that can happen

 

i have a similar problem and today it left me stranded in traffic for about 40 min. i just kept pumping it and eventually it came out. its really anoying and seems to be happening more and more often. correct me if im wrong but isnt the clutch fluid fed from the brake resivour? did you ever get the problem fixed?

im thinking about just replacing the master and slave clutch cylinder cause i have to pass inspection soon and the last thing i want is for the clutch to get stuck while the inpector is driving