I have a 2003 maxima, It was initially an automatic.. I did a 6 speed swap almost 3 years back.. Car has been driving fine since.. I put almost 20k miles on this setup.. Tonight I was driving into work and as I got off the highway and stopped at a light.. I went to accelerate, the car took off fine then began to rev as if I had just sunk the clutch or as if it popped out of gear mid rev.. But car was still in gear.. I pulled over.. The axles are fine, clutch fork moves so it is disengaging fine, the shift linkages are good, the thing is I can go through the gears with the car running, without clutch which scares me and the car doesn't move at all.. I can hear the transmission into every gear, no grinding at all😨.. Goes in feeling normal, not even reverse works.. Hoping i don't need a transmission.. I had it towed to work to try and think of my next move.. Any suggestions or input of what it could be would be greatly appreciated.. Thanks in advance

 

Sounds like a very simple problem. Your clutch is wore out. Look under the hood and make sure your cables are attached. (You seem smart enough to know that) but yea common problem clutch just wore out is what it seams like to me. Easiest thing to do. Pull the starter off and take a peak in there if you see a tone of clutch material left on the clutch disc look elsewhere for problems. If its like 1/16 or 1/32 clutch is just wore out.

 

mhm i will take the starter off to see what i can see, i figured the clutch would have gradual failure.. some kind of slippage leading up to this point.. which i havent had any of.. just stopped driving altogether. and the cables are hooked up and working as intended..

i just found that the fluid in the clutch master cylinder is filthy and black, I've never seen it like this before..

 

Sounds like a failed pressure plate

 

Thanks for the response sir.. That would be a good thing.. I would just hate to need a new transmission.. It's been freezing here in New York this week.. Waiting for a break in the weather to pull it down.

 

sounds like the trans is fine. clutch issue. unless of course you broke the input shaft splites clean off, which i doubt.

 

just an update for the guys who suspected it was the clutch.. you were right after all.. this is what i found after pulling it down yesterday..

 

clutch still has life as you can see, my next step is to try and figure out why this happened and how to make sure it doesn't happen again 2 years down the road, could it be a manufacture defect, misalignment on my part? I'm not sure.. input is appreciated

 

That is some pretty nice damage. How do you drive the car? ie aggressive etc

 

I definitely don't consider my driving habits to be aggressive.. A lot of stop and go traffic but I don't beat on it..

 

that happened to my clutch twice because my flywheel being bad took 2 times to happen for us to inspect the flywheel and the flywheel has two pieces to it since it's a dual mass the outter piece had a bunch of play in it.. caused my clutch disc to break twice

 

Damn that's crazy it just gave out of no where . Glad it wasn't the transmission .

 

That's the thing tho.. I have a Jim Wolf 15lb flywheel.. And the flywheel and this clutch were installed brand new at the same time..

 

Well said.. I'd take the clutch any day over the tranny lol