2012 Fiat 500: transmission slipping

Filed Apr 22, 2017 · Transmission · CA

Clutch wear seems to be excessive for mileage (25k) on vehicle. Clutch is slipping and pressure plate, fork, bearing and related components are failing. Engagement point very high up in pedal travel. Sometimes shifter gets stuck in gear and very difficult to shift gears.

Filed Nov 30, 2015 · Transmission · 28,500 miles · OR

I was driving along at about 30 MPH and my clutch pedal became very difficult to push in and I could not shift. I was lucky enough to turn into a parking lot where I could not put the car into gear. Once the car was off I could move about the gears but once the car was on the pedal would not go down all the way and I could not get it into gear. There has been zero slipping or grinding of the gears and I have less than 30,000 miles. I am currently awaiting if my warranty will cover this issue. From what I have seen online the pressure plate has been cracked out warped so I plan to fight to have this covered under warranty. To think that a clutch would go out in 2.5 years and under 30,000 miles if crazy but when I spoke with fiat dealership he made it seem that they see it all the time and customer care at first said they have seen it multiple times....updated 7/19/16

Filed Nov 2, 2015 · Transmission · 46,000 miles · PA

Clutch failure in traffic after leaving a stop light. No prior warning/signs that the clutch would fail (ie. No slipping). Car started in first just fine, went to shift into second and the clutch would not disengage. The pedal was completely stiff and was unable to be pressed all the way to the floor. I then drifted to the side of the road where I was able to get the car to stop, thankfully I was not going at a higher speed otherwise this problem could have potentially caused a wreck. At this point in time I tried to shift my car into gear (with the car off), but the clutch wouldn't even allow any gears to engage. I had the car towed to my home, and then fiat had the car towed to the nearest dealer of my choice (I still had to pay for the fiat towing). I am currently pending a call from the dealership to diagnose + fix my car, which will most likely have to be payed out of pocket. This is most likely a manufacturer defect, as has been stated in numerous other clutch failure reports for this year's make.

Filed Apr 7, 2015 · Transmission · 28,000 miles · CA

I was at a busy intersection about to make a left hand turn when I suddenly was unable to depress the clutch completely or shift into gear. It turned out the clutch had completely given out with no warning - no slipping, smell of burning clutch, no check engine light, nothing. I've driven stick my whole life and never run through a clutch in 28,000 miles! Nor have I had the experience of a clutch going out without warning - it has always started to slip in advance of needing replaced. The police had to stop traffic and push me to safety as the car would not drive at all. I don't know what I would have done if the police had not come so quickly as I was in an area with a lot of traffic and several people nearly hit me in the short time I was waiting. Due to the out of the blue nature of this clutch failure, I thought it was worth reporting as a safety issue. Had I been on a freeway, the situation could have been much worse.

Filed Feb 16, 2015 · Transmission · 59,000 miles · FL

Last night, while pulling onto the highway, my clutch locked up. My clutch has never shown any sign of wear/tear (no grinding, no slipping, no burning, etc.) and out of nowhere, it clamped shut. Thankfully, there was not much traffic and I pulled over without the hazard of hitting/being hit by another car. I got the car towed to fiat of orange park, and had to wait until they opened today to get a call from them. I was so confused by what could have caused my clutch to do that, last night I searched online and found fiat-owner forums of other people describing the exact same incident happening to them (one guy was in atlanta traffic and almost crashed, another guy was in nyc about to cross the manhattan bridge and almost got into a wreck). They all had, like myself, fiat's with low mileage. Some had 22k miles, some 28kmiles, some 50k, some 60k; hence adding to the bizarre nature of this incident. All incidents resulted in bent pressure plates as well as miscellaneous damage to clutch parts. Fiat of orange park called me today and told me that the damage is my fault, as a result of wear/tear. Despite me explaining to them that this has been an issue with other fiat-owners, they continued to say that I am responsible for the damage. Despite all of the evidence pointing towards a mechanical malfunction, they said I am responsible for repairing the clutch. This seems to be a manufacturer defect and I would like to report this in hope that there might be action taken by you, the federal safety agency, to help the victims of this defect from 1) potential hazard as a result of future incidents 2) paying the large amount for repairing the damage. Thank you for your consideration.

Filed Nov 13, 2014 · Transmission · 54,000 miles · MO

I was driving down a street by a school doing 20 MPH. Went to down shift and the clutch locked up. I could not push it to the floor. Since I could not push the clutch down I could not shift gears. I have driven a clutch for over 30 years and never had to replace a clutch. There was no warning with this. Just happened with no previous slipping or any indication something was going bad with the clutch.