Ok, my car made a wierd high pitched screetching sound the last time it started which made me worried. low and behold it didnt start the next time i tried to start it. I tried jumping it and all i get is a click and the battery appears to drain really fast. I got a new starter and put it in (hopefully the wiring was correct) and all i get is the same click when i try to start it. I dont think it is the starter since it is making the same noise with both starters but im not sure. In the wiring of the starter i just attached the big fat wire to the more driver side nut and the skinny wire to the little flat metal stubbie...is there anythign else i should have had to do? has anyone ran into this before? just email me if you need more details. thanks in advance for the help!!

 

I will second this post, mine is doing the same, i know its not the starter, and I attached the battery from my other car and same deal. Just a click and it doesnt even turn over. Help us

 

clean and tighten the terminals on your battery

 

Or better yet, replace your battery cables.
A quick check to determine battery vs. starter. Turn on your headlights, have a buddy stand in front of the car. Turn on the ignition. If the lights dim it's the battery (or cables/connection), if they don't dim it's the starter. By the way, the local parts store where you bought the starter can and will test your old starter for you.

 

well what you need to do is check the battery ground to the car, then you need to clean up the terminals, once that is done and nothing, check your fuses, or fuseable links.
another thing you might want to try is put it in gear and try to push start it if its a manual could tell you if its just wiring problems or internal.

 

Yeah, I agree with the battery cables. Also, I'm not really sure, but isn't there three cables that go to the starter (power, small wire w/plug, and ground)? Maybe I'm thinking of something else, not sure.

 

One other thing, if you try to start it with the lights on, and the lights DO go dim, then you might want to put her in nuetral and grab ahold of the flywheel and give her a good hard twist. If it doen't move, then your starter isn't working because your engine is siezed. If it does move, then try to start it again to see if maybe there is a bad spot on the flywheel (longshot at best). Good luck!

 

thanks - i will try these methods out and let you know what happens!

 

Allright I triple checked the wiring and cleaned the battery to chassis ground as well as the power wire / starter connection... i hooked up the jumper cables and tried starting it about 10 times. the starter chugged but never got enough power going to start the engine.

So basically, its not a burnt out starter or wasn't at the time I tried to start it this morning. After about 10 times, the car does the same click it did before I cleaned the wiring..it wont turn the starter anymore.. could something be jolting loose down there that is causing an improper ground?

Also. more info on the starter wiring. is the node more to the passanger side of the starter supposed to have a wire (ground?) going from it to somewhere? it appears that there is a ring with a pincher for a wire that was on it but there is no wire visible that was connected to it that i can see... right now I have the power cable hooked up the the driver side node and the harness/clip thingy to the little metal piece but no wire goes from the passanger node...there is a wire running from the body of the starter to that node though...

so basically i am wondering if there is another ground wire that i should rewire off of that node to the chassis somwhere that could have broke / wore off and could be the problem...before i blow my car up trying i thought i should ask though. THANKS ALL!!

 

anybody have any ideas? I think i will try rewiring the battery cables because the lights dimmed when i tried to jump it with them on...what is the most common place the grounding fails?

 

The starter grounds by touching the bellhousing. Make sure the engine and transmission are getting a good ground.

 

Last month I replaced 3 dead starters on 3 cars! The 3 I put in came from 3 different sources and all work good: a JY starter I pulled for $15, a Bosch rebuild from our best local auto parts store for $90, and a $90 ACDelco reman from Rockauto.com

These are my thoughts about starters:

-careful about rebuilds: sometimes you get a bad one, especially the no-names

-check all starters, even one you just pulled out, at the local autostore. Sometimes you find a 'bad' starter that is actually good, which suggests a bad wire temporarily compensated for by the new starter you just put in. It's happened to me.

-one time the tickler wire jumped off the spade lug on the solenoid, but that's easy to diagnose because there's no click at all.

-if you're cheap or broke you can overhaul a starter yourself with just brushes and bushings: it's not rocket science.

-It doesn't take much of a voltage drop to make a starter act wimpy. I've found that a drop of about one volt in the battery lead or the ground lead can incapacitate a starter. I think an old-fashioned D'Arsonval (needle) voltmeter works better than a digital meter for this test. Put the two leads across whatever combination of points you can think of: battery post and ground, etc., wherever you shouldn't find a drop.

-RX-7 cables were made from aluminum so there's a danger of corrosion where the terminal clamps to the wire, especially in salty Minnesota. Check it and replace with copper as necessary. Store bought cables are OK, but for cold Minnesota winters what I did was make my own cables out of welders cable and marine battery clamps (about $10 each at West Marine) for any car that needed to start in winter. Welders cable has much lower resistance than even the heaviest gauge store cables, and is extremely flexible so it's easy to fish into place. Use it to make your own booster cables, too: your boosters will work flawlessly when others fail in -30 weather.

B

 

I had the same problem a short time ago, and after replacing the starter twice I found that the tickler wire had nearly broken in half about 18" up the wire, it finally broke and thats when I found it, check back along the wire for a break.

Your ground comes from the contact with the engine, check your ground wire from the engine to the body. But if this is bad you would have very little power for any accessories.

 

I've found a 1 volt drop between the center of the negative post of the battery and the car chassis, which I then traced to a bad battery ground cable. That puny little 1 volt drop killed the starter (of course, that was in a Fiat!).

B

 

You checked the fusible link under the steering column?

 

There is a ground connection to the driver's-side shock tower, too. Still have that happening?

 

Jump starting a dead battery probably won't give you enough juice to start it. Either charge the battery that's in the car, or swap it out with a good one then try it again.