Jim,
How strange that the pressure plate would be bad but the clutch plate is OK. Maybe you meant the reverse...clutch plate bad, pressure plate OK?
Drew has a good plan. With a relatively tight fitting piece of bar stock, you can fill the cavity with grease...or wet gobs of toilet paper, insert the rod into the pilot bearing and give it a real hard blast with a BFH. Sometimes it works...other times not.
They make internal pullers for slide hammers. Maybe your rental joint has one.
It isn't natural for the pressure plate to be toast but the clutch to be OK. Keep a sharp eye out for a reason this happened. It's possible the clutch plate is full thickness, but cooked and glazed and has lost all its friction ability, frying the pressure plate in the mean time.
Any oil leaking into the bellhousing could have caused this, and will do the same to your new assembly if it isn't repaired.
Stuart
