Clutch Bleeding Disaster!

Now that I had my bleeding kit, I went ahead and bled the brakes.  Using DOT 4 fluid, the front and rear systems were bled without issue.  The reservoirs were left at the "Full" mark.

I moved onto the clutch bleeding where it apperared to bleed ok.  I tried the pedal and it all seemed good.  Again, topped up the resorvoir to the "Full" mark.

A while later, I noticed a small puddle of fluid underneath the gearbox bellhousing.  The clutch reservoir level ad dropped. On investigating with a torch, and peeking in through only a few of the small openings, I could see that the fluid supply fitting had a small weep.  If you remember I made a fitting here.

Since this is all inside the bellhousing, and also the fitting was made to a sort length for neatness, I couldn't tighten the fitting from outside the gearbox housing. (Hindsight would have been a great thing).

I managed to get a spaer fitted inside but couldn't turn it. I then got a 4" adjustable spanner inside and could manage to put a bit of pressure on to nip up the fitting.  As you can imangine, you can't put very much force onn with a 4" adjustable, but I managed to put enough on to break the clutch slave cylinder and release bearing!  Needless to say, the rest of the fluid poured out into the floor.

The only way to fix this was to remove the engine!

I had to undo the front support brace, the cooling water reservoir, exhaust manifolds, starter, undo te fuel hoses and wiring thenn it just lifted out!  The design of the housing has a thin section as the fitting goes into it.  Possibly been weakened before?

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What it should look like

I managed to weld the piece back on, lengthened the fittings so they could be tightened outside of the bellhousing, and put it all back together again.  Bled the system and all appeared well.....  Watch this space!