possible siezed clutch, help wanted.

[swamp]

The car is an 82 rangie with a 4 speed that I rebuilt in 04 , coupled to a 4.6 . I did a comp in october , moved the car out of the drive way 3 weeks ago and start it up every week. But yesterday I went to move it out and the clutch won't disengage i.e it is stuck in drivemode , the clutch pedal has feel , the clutch has no leeks and the rubber pipe is not swollen or distorted.
I topped up the fluid
Put the garden hose up the drain plug
Took of the lower inspection plate off the gearbox, lots of dirty greasy dirty stuff in there.
Removed th slave cylinder, more dirty greasy shit.
I dont really know what to do now.
My first thought is that all the sicky stuff has glued the plates together and although the pedal moved the fingers it couldn't release the plates.

Any thoughts will be appreciated.
Regards Michael.

[cpmurray]

Michael,
The exact same thing used to happen to my 80" after the field day. Was mud like stuff that got in between the clutch plate and the fly wheel. I ended up pulling the gearbox out to clean it, as after nearly a year it was still doing it. Are you able to start it in gear with your foot on the clutch? That worked for me some times.

[RangingRover]

Got a good bullbar? This used to happen on an old series landie we had after some rain, fix was to stick it in first low, start her up (in gear, obviously) and drive into a tree with your foot on the clutch. The wheels stop moving, but the engine wants to keep going, so it can shock the clutch plate into unsticking.

Worth a go if you've got a decent bar and tree.... Else you could get a mate round with his 4by, chain on the towbar or similar, wack your car in a gear (say first if pulling it backwards), foot on the clutch, and give it a yank.

Try Cpmurrays trick first - basically the same thing, but a bit less violent.

Whats most likely happened is the friction plate has glued itself to the flywheel with whatever (rust, mud, grease etc). When you put your foot on the clutch, it operates the pressure plate correctly (releasing the clamping force on the friction plate), but because the friction plate is glued to the flywheel (rather than being just clamped by pressure plate), you still get drive into the gearbox, not allowing you to select gears.

[swaggi]

i had this happen to swaggi a few years ago.
i connected the garden hose up to the drain plug hole and filled the bell housing with water for a week or two. every day or two i turned the tap on to get some fresh water moving around in there. the dirty water comes out somewhere higher in the bell housing between the engine.
it worked and freed it up.........
till when your up the bush and put it in low range and need some drive it will start slipping when you least want it to.
once its freed up...........change the clutch and preasure plate some time sooner rather than later

[swamp]

Thanks for the replies.
I got into it today, had a few dramas bleeding the clutch, then all was good
to strap it up to the lamp post on the street ( I drive my old series into trees up on the block at Noojee to do some clearing, but I just rebuilt ,modded, strengthened and painted my bars on the rangie) first low and away it went till the slack got taken up and it stalled. loads of tension on the strap so I cant disengage gear.
I put another strap on the back and tried to pull it backwards with the work ute but started spinning tyres
Then got the Pull Pal out and ratcheted it back ( I think I was at the limit of the pullpal ) but success sort of as i had it back in neutral.
I had a thought about slipping the clutch into submission, start in third high with revs, gave it a crack and bang the transfer case was not engaged properly.
I was a little woried at this stage but for some reason it had done the trick and the clutch would now disengage.
Any all is good and I moved the rangie onto the workshop slab I poured a few weeks ago, 10 years of doing work under the car on a gravel surface is enough.
I even bought a garage creeper, magnificent.
CHEERS