Good evening from Florida!

I would like to start off by saying I am not a mechanic at all. Please dumb down any advice you may offer. I am pretty decent at following directions. I replaced the clutch in my 2004 Honda Accord, it was a monumental job for someone like myself. I just got the car back together tonight. The car will not go into 1st gear while on, I can put it in second gear and was able to drive down the road and back with no issues with 2nd-5th gear. I did notice that pressing the clutch in while slowing down and trying to place it in third gear or second (to use the engine to slow me down) the car didn't want to drop into gear unless I revved it up a little. I was also unable to put the car in reverse. So while running I physically can not pull or push the shifter **** into 1st or reverse.

While running all the gears seen super tight and I feel much more resistance in my shift ****. I never disconnected the master cylinder or hydraulic thingy when doing this clutch replacement. I disconnected it from the transmission but never bled the clutch. Was I supposed to do that after replacing the clutch?

Thank you for any input you may have.

 

Bleeding the clutch at the slave cylinder is pretty simple and quick to do, so I'd say it is worth a shot. I don't know if this will fix your problem.


The other area to quickly inspect is the shift cable connections to the transmission. Make sure you have them connected properly.

The other items are inside the bell housing and would require removing the transmission to inspect. Did you install the throw-out bearing properly? Did you install the clutch friction disk where the face where the springs stick out more are facing towards the transmission and not towards the flywheel?

 

Sounds like the clutch is dragging a little bit. When you press the clutch pedal to disengage the clutch, it's not completely disengaged. If it were an old clutch it might be the clutch disk getting thin (worn out) and either warped or fraying so it drags on the flywheel & pressure plate.

Couple things to check...

- I'm assuming you can get it into 1st without any problem if the engine is not running. True? Park the car where there's generous space in front... Then put into 1st, hold clutch pedal down, & start the engine. If the car wants to lurch forward, even a little bit, then the clutch is dragging.

- Try pumping the clutch pedal a couple times then hold it down. Does it improve getting into 1st? If so, that points to a hydraulic problem which fortunately is all outside so you don't have to remove the transmission.

- Have a helper in the drivers seat. Engine NOT running. Hold a small scale alongside the clutch throw-out lever (the lever that the slave cylinder pushes). Assuming the clutch has been sitting for awhile (over an hour?) push the pedal down once & measure how far the lever moves. I think it should be about 10mm. Compare to the distance it moves when pumping it repeatedly. If the first pump moves less, and the movement gets larger when pumped, then bleed the clutch.

- When you took the clutch slave cylinder off, how did you keep it? There's a spring pushing the piston out from the cylinder; did you hold it in with some wire or something? If it popped out and you put it back in, you would have gotten air in there. Worse yet, you might have damaged the fine lip on the piston seal unless you took off the rubber boot & carefully pushed it back inside.

Post back if you want any advice on bleeding the clutch. But I'm guessing you have a shop manual anyway for replacing the clutch...

 

Thank you both so much, I will be home later this afternoon and go over everything that you both recommended and report back. I appreciate the time you both took to answer me.