Clutch Murder in the Second Degree

As long as I've been married, I've told my husband that he needs to quit sitting on the clutch of our standard-shift truck at the stoplights. It is not that hard to shift it to neutral and hold the foot brake, and it's not like Florida has a ton of hills where he has to worry about rolling backwards.

My husband's response has always been: "I've driven tons of stick-shifts and I've never worn out the clutch."

I say: "My dad is a mechanic and he says it wears it out faster."

He says: "Whatever, I'm not changing the way I drive because I don't think that's true."
 
So... not only today did I get to tell him "I told you so." But so did the transmission mechanic as he handed us a bill for $730 dollars. (Clutch and slave chamber replacement.)  The icing on the cake though... is that this is the same guy we just paid $2000 dollars two days prior to rebuild the transmission on our 05 Taurus because that failed on my way home from picking my brother up at the airport at 1 am.

!!TWO FREAKING TRANSMISSIONS IN ONE WEEK?!!

I see you removed my transmission, now can you  put it back where you found it?

 (For the record:  both vehicles are Fords. The Taurus is an automatic and has 75k. The tranny problem was inherited from the manufacturer because Ford used cheap metal to make the torque converter. The truck is an 03 Ranger at 90k, and I do take regular and good care of all our cars.)

Clutch disc worn down to the rivets.

Today's lesson is: It is much cheaper to replace your brakes than to pay someone $85 an hour to take out the transmission and replace the clutch. 

It is also cheaper to replace a clutch than to rebuild an automatic transmission. 

Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2009/11/28/1074502_save-your-clutch-be-neutral.html#storylink=cpy

DON'T SIT ON THE CLUTCH AT RED LIGHTS, AND DON'T SAY I DIDN'T TELL YOU SO!

Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2009/11/28/1074502_save-your-clutch-be-neutral.html#storylink=cpy