Broken clutch, cause?

Helium_Junkie · 29 Jan 2008 at 09:29

My car has started being difficult to put into gear, it's very hard to push the gearstick into the gates, but once in its ok - which sounds to me like a clutch problem.
My question is, at the weekend my car was shunted by one behind as I stopped for a red light. I was in gear at the time and stalled, and shortly afterwards this problem started. Could this kind of shunt be what caused the problem? Or is it just an extreme coincidence that the clutch started acting up so soon afterwards (I parked the car within 3 minutes afterwards, then when I came back a couple of hours later and tried to pull away the problem begun).

BigglesPiP · 29 Jan 2008 at 09:31

What's the gearbox oil like?

Dogbreath · 29 Jan 2008 at 10:22

Does the clutch bite very low down? Was you car in gear with the clutch engaged when it was shunted? If so it's possible (though perhaps unlikely) that the clutch friction plate could have been damaged by the shock loading through the transmission.

ci_newman · 29 Jan 2008 at 11:14

Depending on how the chassis has been affected, the gear linkage could have been bent in the shunt too...

Helium_Junkie · 29 Jan 2008 at 15:03

Oh dear :S
I didnt report it to my insurers at the time as I couldnt see any obvious damage. What should I do? I have the other persons details.