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Gear not holding car when parked on hill 200

Hello,

I have a 5 speed standard 240. When parking on the hills of San Francisco, my car does not hold, even with car in gear with parking brake. It slides, stops, then slides again. I don't hear the engine turning over. What's up?
Also, the clutch is really high. Is there a way to adjust the clutch?

Thanks,

Jason








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Gear not holding car when parked on hill 200

How many miles on your Brick ? If facing down hill, in reverse gear, or up hill in 1st gear, and Brick rolls a small bit, stops....rolls again. Engine is loosing compression. High mileage can cause this. If wrong choice of gear, 5th (or any forward gear) facing down hill, or reverse facing up hill....no car will hold (stay in place). Yep, parking / emergency brake needs to be adjusted. As mentioned, 3-4 clicks should lock up parking / e- brakes. Easiest to remedy....parking/ e-brakes. Even if you have to replace the brake pads, a bear to do, but well worth the effort.








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Surprising.... choice of gear, parking brake adjustment, and safe parking on hills 200

That's surprising, even though I've been to San Francisco. As I remember it, only a few streets are "extreme" slopes. Are you on one of those extreme cases?

But I doubt it's a slipping clutch -- if it was, I doubt you could get the car going when you drive it -- there's a lot more torque being applied when normally driving (normal acceleration) than when simply being pulled downhill by gravity. But perhaps the clutch is about to "go south", having cooked it on S.F.'s hills.

Assuming the clutch is OK, what gear are you in when you park it? In high (5th) gear, you probably could see the car roll quite a bit, since it wouldn't cause as much engine rotation as it would if you left it in 1st gear, where it would take a considerable amount of engine rotation -- which of course would better serve to resist the car's rolling. In other words, 1st gear would hold the car better. In fact, I'm not familiar with the 5-speed's gear ratios, but in some cars, the lowest gear ratio is actually reverse -- although typically less robust, that's not important here, but ratio is -- you might have more holding power leaving it in reverse, if reverse is lower than 1st on your transmission.

Of course, you description, "...It slides, stops, then slides again...", does seem to imply that maybe the engine is going through a rotation -- by "slides", do you mean "rolls"? You don't mean that the car is moving even though the tires aren't rotating? That would suggest that you are using one of the higher gears, instead of the lowest.

All this aside, of course, the parking brake probably needs tightening -- you should only be able to pull up the lever about 3 to 4 clicks. Have you turned the 17mm nut to tighten the cables? It's to the rear of the parking brake lever -- access to it is through the passage exposed when you remove the ashtray in the back of the console.

Finally, as a backup until you fix whatever needs fixing, are you using the curb? When you learned how to drive, were you taught to turn your front wheels into the curb (as a backup to the brakes, etc.) when parking on a steep hill? Assuming a two-way street, when facing uphill, you turn your steering wheel to the left; when facing downhill, you turn to the right, so that the curb serves as a safety backup to a failed parking brake (or "park" cog in the transmission) -- kind of like leaving a block behind your tires when you're on a boat ramp.

Good luck.








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Surprising.... choice of gear, parking brake adjustment, and safe parking on hills 200

You can get ticketed for not curbing your wheels (at least in San Francisco).

--
alex







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