Yesterday I was working on my SVX bleeding the brakes, and when i finished i decided to take it for a drive, so i took it out the brakes worked great. So i took was taking my friend home that helped blead the brakes, then at a stop light my clutch cable broke so we pushed the SVX out of the street and parked it a a seven eleven. I went back with my tool to see exacly what happened the cable jsut broke right were it bends at the transimission. So my dad came with a legacy and we pushed started and i drove it home (4-5 miles through seattle) with out the clutch, first time doing do that on a sube. Is this normal to ahve the clutch cable break? I called the dealer and they said that it happens fairly often, but we never replaced it on my dads old legacy with 350,000 miles on it. I have a stronger presure plate with a aftermarket clutch so i guess it would make it harder, but the pedal fells the same as all the other 5spd cable subes i dorve, so it cant be that much stiffer.

It happens, seemingly at random.

I'm sure some folks on this board know this, but with a broken cable/hydraulic system, the car can be driven and shifted without a clutch. The starter will get the car going in 2nd gear rather easily.

Absolutely, Tiny. However, I would only do so if I was stuck in the middle of nowhere. Would rather wait for a tow, and not stress my starter and synchro-rings.

A manual transmission in an SVX? You do the swap? Jay

Couldn't agree with you more Setright, but if you don't know how to do it, it's worth just a bit of practice so if you need to, you can.

The older models have had their share of this and usually its because of misrouting the cable. In the old ones its usually going to snap at the point near the steering link because it gets rubbed by a toothed edge piece over time.

The telltale sign of a worn/ready-to-go clutch cable is when it gets kinda heavy, and may feel like there's sand in the sheath (kinda gritty).

 

I have heard of a few tales of cables breaking too.

I had no idea the starter would move car in gear. I only had to do a couple 1st 2nd shifts, about 4, and only one ground a little so i dont think i did any real damage to the box. The clutch cable felt kind of squisy, before it went. It broke off by the transmission at he first bend. The wire seemed to break at 2 parts, about 1/2inch apart, about half the wire was broke at onepart and half at the other.

 

Gravel RX, yeah i did a 5spd swap in the SVX. Makes thecar alot quickeroff its feet.