TL;DR - For the last several months my clutch pedal hasn't been returning fully. Clearly, the plastic bushings on the torsion spring are wearing out (they're squeaky too), so I'll be replacing the torsion spring with a linear spring.
I don't know why, but not all manual transmission 1st gen Tacomas use the same spring to return the clutch pedal to the out position. Those equipped with a 4-cylinder engine use a linear spring (90507-14030), and those with a 6-cylinder use a torsion spring.
The problem with the torsion spring isn't the spring itself - it's plenty strong and never wears out. Rather, it's the plastic bushings that capture the ends of the spring which eventually wear through, keep the spring from rotating, and can't easily be replaced.
The solution is to remove the torsion spring and convert the clutch pedal to use the linear spring from the 4-cylinder Tacomas, so that's what I'm planning to do. I've even got the linear spring, I just need to find the time to install it.
This little guy will solve all my problems.
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