Well, it's (happily) been a while since I've had trouble that's driven (pun entirely intentional) me here to the forums.

This time, it's a "won't start", with some background.

To lead: I've been mostly unemployed for most of the last 9 months, so a lot of questions that start "why didn't you just" end in "cause I'm just barely paying the rent". :-)

Back in November, I was sitting in line at a McDonalds, waiting for a Big Mac, when snap! something changed about my idling engine. Idle went rough on me; driving home was a bit... exciting. Mileage went in the tank, as well; over the next week, and since, I've been getting 8/10 city. No untoward MIL codes, though, oddly.

And none in general, except Thanksgiving day, driving to my sister's 10 miles away, during which run I got the blinkenlight almost continuously.

But not driving home.

And in general, not much until about last week.

Had it into my general mechanic about December 15th, when it got Even Worse; he diagnosed possible bad spark on the center 2 cylinders on the drivers' side, replaced a plug (and an air filter I really should have caught), and returned it from execrable to merely miserable.

During this time, I'd also started noticing that it was being crankier and crankier (this pun accidental) about starting up; I couldn't leave it sitting with any load at all -- not even the radio -- without running the risk of it not being able to start at all... and this seemed like your normal "dying battery" "won't start", confirmed when yesterday, I got a replacement battery (a DieHard Platinum AGM with a 9 year warranty). With a full charge on that battery...

now it won't crank at all. I don't *think* it's even pulling the solenoid in, though I haven't had a spare pair of ears/hands to be certain of that.

Idling voltage after charge is about 12.8V; when I turn the key to start, that drops to 11.8, though as I say, no cranking whatever. On the original battery, it would pull the voltage down far enough for the dashboard to drop out (which isn't happening on the new one, of course), but at least it would crank a little; 1 or 2 revs.

No alarm light indications; good odometer reading; tried the "lock with key 3 times" routine, nothing there either.

I've tried the "whack it with a hammer" approach, but from the top, I can't get past the heat shield, and I don't have a set of stands to try to get at it from the bottom.

A full volt of drop on keyturn suggests to me that *something* is being loaded; I'm tentatively assuming that the solenoid is still ok, even if the starter proper is not.

All diagnostic suggestions cheerfully accepted. :-)

My personal feeling was that perhaps the bad mileage, poor running, and bad starting (and codes) might all have come from a shorted cell in the old battery (it was down around 11V standing with no load), but I cannot test that theory, until I can get the damn thing to start again...

 

Someone in some thread also suggested something about "leave the key on for 5 minutes so the BCU can resync with the relay pack under the steering wheel"; tried that too with no luck.

I should have mentioned that the battery was disconnected for about 4 hours while I went out after its replacement.

 

You know, I'm curious: I see people talking about "I have to whack the starter with a hammer every time, but it works". How do you do that? Don't you have to take the heat shield *off* to reach the starter with a hammer? Or am I missing something?

 

Just lay on your back and reach up to the bottom of the starter and hit it with a hammer. Sounds like your problems go beyond the starter, though. Have you checked your grounds? Make sure that the end on the engine block isn't corroded. Might be worth connecting a jumper cable between your negative battery terminal and a decent grounding point on the engine to see if it will start.

 

I'm apparently too thick to fit. :-)

Plus, it picked today to rain a lot. I checked the grounding points on the buss behind the battery box, but I didn't check the other end of the strap. FWIW, though, when I've had to jump start it a couple times recently, I was....

going to say "I grounded to the alternator bracket as recommended, and it jumped just fine, right away"... but that's not true. Monday night, when this latest layer of trouble kicked in, it did *not* in fact let me crank it immediately; perhaps the engine end of the grounding strap is getting troublesome. I will do the cross-connect test with my jumper cables when I get back home. Thanks.

(I'm still accepting other suggestions, in the interim, of course ;-)

 

Nope, over-grounding the block to the battery didn't help either.

All I hear when I turn the key is a click near the radio (BCU?) and one to the left of the binnacle.

 

Well it's quit raining, and might even warm up a bit this weekend, so, jackstands or no, I'll slide my lazy oversized *** underneath and try to get a hammer on the starter tomorrow morning.

 

Well, I checked the fuse (good) and the relay (pulls in, and has +12 on the source contact), and then we finally got (my skinnier friend) Dennis underneath from the front, and he could reach the starter with a hammer, and he whacked it a couple times.

*Now*, I can hear the starter gear try to pull in -- it's quite loud and metallic and twangy; I don't believe it's just the solenoid -- but no spinning at all, and the batt voltage pulls down only from 12.34 to 12.0 (not the 10-11v I would expect if the motor was actually being connected), so I am assuming either a bad contact on the solenoid or an open winding on the starter.

Or, I suppose, a loose +12 connection on the starter motor itself, but without jackstands, I can't tell. At least I don't think it's anywhere else but inside the heat shield at this point.

 

Replaced the starter and it behaved better for a while; the starter was apparently the target of a topside oil leak. Had to replace it again shortly thereafter (6 months?), but that was after my tranny work, during which they'd apparently also fixed that oil leak; by that time, the problem *was* the battery, which has also been replaced, closing this thread, too.