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SMT Clutch Issues

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2K views 5 replies 3 participants last post by  Drunk_Chicken  
#1 ·
Hey guys,

Recently purchased a 2001 MR2 Spyder in RHD with 200k KM on the clock (120k miles). Was going fine for a couple of months until two issues arose:

1) Clutch appears to be slipping. Putting your foot down at cruising speed produces high revs, but no increase in speed as the clutch tries to keep traction and if pushed too hard, will produce clutch smoke and a beeping noise will start (no SMT light however).

2) When first starting and driving, after changing into second, a rather loud banging noise comes from the gearbox as the clutch seems to disengage, then there is complete power loss, then it reengages. After the gearbox is up to temp it doesn't have this issue anymore.

I contacted the previous owner about the issue and he told me the car had not had a new clutch in the last two years but that the owner prior to this had had it done at some point.

My guess is the clutch is toast and needs replacing, but is there anything else worth checking before I go down this route?

Also, is a 2ZZ clutch upgrade recommended? Or even something else completely?

Is any of this symptomatic of low gearbox oil?

Many thanks in advance.
 
#5 ·
Pull the input speed sensor on the bottom of the transmission and check it to see if there's metal or wearing. Wearing could mean main transmission bearing going out or you hit something with it and pushed the sensor into the transmission and now it doesn't work. Metal could be nothing, just general wear from the age of the car and the sensor is magnetic and picks up everything floating in the gear oil but the sensor won't work if it gets too much. It's supposed to look like a nipple if it's good, if the center metal is flush with the plastic, there's wearing. Other than that, only things that wouldn't allow speed matching is the crank speed sensor, but there'd be more problems than that, and the speedos, but you would have an ABS warning also if one of those were bad. A bent clutch fork would also make the position sensors read wrong, but you can check that. You're going to need a true relearn after a clutch change, so if you don't have techstream, expect to haul it to Mr. T. and have them do it, shouldn't be more than a computer diagnostic.

So steps with techstream: Run it with the comp hooked up and when it does it, see what's out of values and work with that.
Without techstream: Drain gear oil, check input speed sensor, change clutch and fork, take it to toyota for relearn, if it still happens then buy techstream and adapter cord, then check values.