Almost certainly a leak of some sort.  Crawl under the van and look at
and feel the clutch slave cylinder for signs of wetness.  Search down
around the footwell for signs of a leak also.  You'll probably find that
one or the other (master or slave) has a leak.

These tend to go at about the same time in my experience, so you might as
well replace or repair both.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Tom Young               young@sherlock.SIMS.Berkeley.EDU
Lafayette, CA  94549    '81 Vanagon
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On Fri, 3 Oct 1997, Michael D. Landis wrote:

> Over two days my clutch pedal has gotten very loose, to the point where
> it's almost all "play". The clutch still engages fully, I have no trouble
> shifting, but to engage it I have to depress the pedal all the way to the
> floor and only the last couple inches actually activate the clutch. Letting
> off the clutch gradually takes some very subtle footwork.
>
> I didn't know the clutch was hydraulic, and even the guy at the Parts Place
> was surprised when he checked the Bentley manual and found that the clutch
> and brakes share the master cylinder. Anyway, the brake fluid was a hair
> low, I topped it up and this helped the clutch slightly for a day. Now it's
> all loose again but the fluid level is still good and there are no apparent
> leaks. Has anyone else experienced this problem or have any suggestions?