i just took in my 1998 honda prelude 5-speed base model, into the shop because i couldnt start it when it was in gear. The guy said it was my master cylinder and he fixed it. He also said that he adjusted my clutch. Today was the second day of having it back and i noticed my tach was not responding right. So i went hard from first to second and my tach didnt drop below 6,000 rpms. So as you can see major clutch problems. What i was wondering is when he replaced the master cylinder and tuned my clutch what would cause it to slip? my prelude only has 50k on it? what would be a main thing that he might of missed or is it actually slipping?? any advice would help thanks

 

After you shifted your tachometer stayed the same? If you clutch was slipping you should have felt it when you shifted....also your rpms will increase but you will not gain speed

 

yes when i red lined first gear the tach only dropped to 6,000 and then today i test drove it to see if it was still doing it and in third gear i was doing 25 and pushed in the gas and the tach just jumped to 6,000 when i was going about 30 mph. it felt like i was driving in neutral. My clutch is also way stiffer then usual too

 

i would say you need a new clutch h:

 

are you the original owner? you heard the engine revving at the same time the tach jumped, correct? you really should get more than 50k out of a clutch. do a search for "rev matching" because if you learn how to do it your clutch will last 3x that long, no joke!

 

no, i just got it about 3000 miles ago, is rev matching when you are down shifting you blip the gas so it is easier on the clutch? kind of like heel toe down shifting??

 

yes. you really should blip before you even shift, that way you're going easy on the tranny as well as the clutch.

 

allright check this out im not sure if this is your problem but here ya go-- a while back i put a master cyl in a vigor. car came back a few thousand miles later and the complaint was clutch slippage. turns out we got a faulty master cylinder and it wasnt letting all of the fluid to return to the resevoir so the clutch wasnt releasing completely (so it didnt have all of its clamping force and it would slip when you stomped on the pedel) now we came to this conclusion by trying to pry the clutch fork back. it wouldnt move. we replaced the master cyl and pry'd (thats not how you spell that) the clutch fork back. problem solved. so you might try that.

 

well i got it back today and the mechanic told me that i had an air lock in one of my hoses to my clutch. he said that that was what my problem was. So today i got on it and everything is working fine. thanks for the help

 

Once you truly get a good feel for your car, you can shift with the clutch so smoothly the engine will decrease RPMs on the gear change like an automatic transmission. The key to it is never letting taking your foot completely off the gas pedal. You don't have to "blip" it, but you just let off a little when you push in the clutch. It's hard to describe. I found the sweet spot of my shifts after I had my car about 3 months, and ever since, it's been smooth as silk. I've got 147,500 miles on my original, factory clutch. And I'd say there's at least 50k left in it.