Bigger Problem - Clutch

["Jim Reeve" <ultra@xxxx>]

Well, today somthing went horribly wrong. I was shifting from 2nd to 
3rd, when the clutch had no initial pressure and about half way down 
had extremely high pressure. It then clashed when going into 3rd gear, 
and I knew I had a problem. I pulled it back into neutral and coasted 
into a parking lot. I tried pushing the clutch in again, it went in 
with great resistance (again, high pressure) then the pedal came out, 
but I dont think the clutch did. I could pump the pedal on and off 
with no resistance, but I could also put it in gear with the engine 
running, so the clutch must have been stuck disengaged. I checked 
around the hose, I didn't see any kinks, no fluid. I went back in the 
car and started pumping the clutch again, this time it was a random 
series of heavy pressure and no pressure, then it finally had 
absolutely no pressure. I looked back under the car again and all the 
clutch fluid dumped strait out of the back at the slave cylinder. I'm 
getting the car towed home this evening, but I am curious as to what 
exactly happened. Obviously, I burst some kind of seal either in the 
slave cylinder or the clutchline right by it. So whatever broke needs 
to be replaced. But I am also wondering if somthing in the clutch may 
have siezed up and caused the high pressure, then pushing the pedal 
broke the seal and dumped the fluid. My throwout bearing has made 
noise ever since I bought the car. I dont know any service history, 
but I do know that at some point recently all clutch hydraulics had 
been replaced. Both master and slave cylinders are fairly clean along 
with having a braided stainless clutchline. I guess my main concern 
if this could be the clutch itself, is the noisy throwout bearing a 
sign of what happened, or what? This may have done it in for the car 
the rest of this year. Thanks for any help.

Jim Reeve
MNDMC - Minnesota DeLorean Club
DMC-6960