Hi everyone!

My daughter has bought a 2003 Discovery as her first car. It is a base model with 70K miles and auto transmission. She is having an intermittent starting problem where she will turn the key and get nothing. When it does turn over, it starts right away.

It has a brand new battery, the alternator has been checked and is fine and the starter was replaced 2 years ago (about 8,000 miles).

Could it be the crank sensor, the starter relay or the immobilizer alarm system?

Any ideas would be gratefully received.

Thanks!

 

If the crank sensor was failing, you would still have the engine turn over, just not start, and how long does she have to wait before it will start?. Verify that there is nothing instead of just not starting. As for the inerita switch, they can fail, have her try resetting it when this occurs and see if it makes any difference.

 

There is no set time to wait - sometimes it is a minute, sometimes the next morning.

There is nothing, no starter motor action...it is not turning over, just dead.

What is the inertia switch?

Sometimes if she turns the steering wheel it makes it start...but not always.

 

Starting to sound like an ignition switch, does she have a mechanic that she uses, I would get it in.
The inerita switch shuts the engines, to start, off if the ECU thinks you have been in an accident.

 

Yep, it either cranks and starts right up or doesn't crank at all. That places the blame on the ignition circuit somewhere I suspect. Headlights are bright all the time, alternator was checked and is fine, new starter, new battery. It is going in Thursday for brakes so we will have them try (again) to troubleshoot this.

I am only glad we are outside the VIN dead zone for bad oil pumps. Thank you for your help - I will post again after I hear what happens on Thursday.

 

It could be a bad neutral safety switch.
Next time it happens have her shift into neutral and then try to start it.

 

Apparently the problem will not happen while at the dealer...leaving my daughter with a car that will sometimes refuse to start and no ideas on how to correct the problem.

The dealer says they can't fix it if they can't reproduce it and they want her to pick it up.

Any ideas please?

 

Ask them to have one of their techs drive it home for the night and bring it back tomorrow.
They need to actually drive it to try and reproduce it.

 

x2 on what Spike said. I have lost count the number of times I have scared my stepson, bringing home a new vehicle from work (while test driving) claiming I traded my Disco for whatever it was.

*not that my stepson is ever going to drive the Disco (that's what mom's car is for, and he is going to get his first car the way I got my first car: get a job and buy it)