Been wanting a softer pedal ever since I got the car, so by luck I found a pretty good fix!!

Took the master cylinder apart and cut the spring inside a bit to make it easier to push.

Anyone know why that spring is there in the first place ? The pressure plate should create enough pressure to push everything back, shouldn't it?.. I m just thinking of maybe removing the spring altogether..

I can finally press the pedal without my back hurting.. Will help shift a lot faster now too:)

There's just the little issue of the throwout bearing resting on the diaphragm fingers 24/7 and wearing itself out. Not sure if this will happen with your mod or whether it will actually wear out the bearing, but it's one reason the spring is there.

I managed to kill an oem T/o bearing in a year or so. Not sure how but I have a feeling it had to do with slight constant pressure on the bearing.

Hmm, I dont know, but I figured out the more practical reason the spring is there..

Without it, the system wouldnt work..
since the pedal is not physically connected to the piston, it cannot retract it, so without the spring you wouldn't be able to bleed the system and build up pressure.. the piston would just go in and stay there. We'll have to see about the bearing.. I'll easily change a bearing once a year for a softer pedal:)

I cut the spring up just enough so the piston stil comes out all the way ..

I wonder why they did the push piston type with heavy spring inside, rather than spring on the clutch pedal itself with a hard link to the piston.

I also just noticed that the slave cylinder is not easily compressed any more like before..

before I could just compress it any time , probably was that way to releive some pressure off the throwout bearing like you say..

I guess the piston doesnt retract enough now to allow fluid to be pushed back to the reservoir..
gotta figure out a way to fix that now.

Heh, you learn something new every day

I would take care of that cause t/o bearings are bitches. When it dies on you in the middle of china town in san francisco, you won't be happy

Yup, I didnt even know how a master cylinder works exactly before this..
I m gonna get a different spring.. hopefully a easier to compress one that is still able to push the piston back far enough. Mabe do a combination and add a very soft one to the clutch pedal too, looks like if the pedal is retracted then the slave can be pushed in.. since when you push it, it forces the master back all the way.. but if the pedal is resting on it.. it cant.

I'll figure something out.. at least now I have something to tinker with, where as before I had a heavy duty clutch pedal, and the spring inside the cylinder kept bending sideways, and making loud clicking noises.. I had on post on that and nobody was able to figure it out.

Have you read this? Clutch tips from RRE
This link is taken from Road Race Engineering, who by the way, have two awesome GSX's in the latest issue of Sport Compact Car for the Ultimate Street Car Challenge.

Pretty good stuff,
Didnt know about the fork alignment before..

It says if its towards the passenger side it will hit the bell housing, what does this mean, and how is it bad?.. I think mine is a bit to the passenger side, gotta check though.

The slave cylinder pushes the fork (by means of a small rod) towards the passenger side of the car. If the fork sits too far towards the passenger side already, then it would hit the bell housing when you push on the clutch pedal.

I'm pretty sure I have this problem, but I need to check as well. I think the best way is to have an assistant press the pedal a few times while you check. But as you know, sometimes the pedal may work fine, and sometimes it may be stiff, so you've got to be there when the problem actually shows up.

In the meantime, you can get by without pressing the clutch all the way down, since what's probably happening when you force it, is you're letting fluid past the seals--a.k.a. wrecking the seals.

I took my car into Magnus earlier this year for the stiff pedal and they replaced my master cylinder because it was leaking from forcing the clutch pedal down--I'm sure it was still good though--and the problem was still there.

Then I read the RRE pages and thought the problem was hydraulic related, so I took apart the whole system and confirmed everything worked fine. BTW, send them an e-mail and ask them if your spring-modification is safe. They are very knowledgeable and friendly.

Check this site for posts about stiff clutch pedals--December and October. The symptoms don't match any of the crankwalk ones. (Have you found that sometimes your clutch doesn't seem to disengage properly between high rpm shifts?)

The best way to fix it is to replace the fork and pivot. Another cheaper way might be to grind a little off the arm and bell housing--I haven't tried this but I may. Don't try it unless you totally understand how the mechanical system works.

Do you still have the problem? It's tough to confirm that cutting the spring fixed the problem, since you also replaced the fluid and bled the system as part of the experiment.

Personally, I'd replace the spring.

its still softer yes, and its the spring that is the problem.. I m also looking into replacing it with a different one,
but I d say you can definitely cut one or two windings from this one without affecting the normal operation.. but one or two windings won't give you a much softer pedal. I ve done the fluid bleeding before too, i m 100% its the spring.. some cylinders might have different springs too, I think.

By the way, what happens when the throwout bearing fails ?..
I recently changed it, for a dealer one, and ever since I changed it, I hear a on/off buzzing ghrrring noise when the idle is high, 1500-2000.
I know its from the tranny because if I press the clutch it goes away.. It also does it more when its cold than when it gets to operating temp.

I heard this noise even before my clutch pedal mod, so I m sure its not my mod that changed anything...