So, my car has been in the shop (dealer) for two weeks, and they are stumped. I’m about to go pick it up later this afternoon and give up. Car is a 2001 Saturn SL1, with about 95k miles. Battery is just under 3 years old.
Backstory, two weeks ago today, the car would not start. Electronics/dashboard lights/headlights all seemed fine, but nothing when I turned the key all the way, no clicking, nothing. Had it towed to the shop, who said they would get to it on Monday. I went back the next day to get some stuff out of it, and the tech guy decided to try starting it, and it started up just fine. Thinking it was just a glitch, I drove it the rest of the day, and a chunk of the next day, maybe 6-7 short trips. After stopping at a store for 5 minutes, I come out to find it “dead” again. Same thing, electronics, lights work, absolutely nothing when I turn they key. I leave the car parked at the store overnight, and figure I’ll get a tow in the morning. I come back in the morning, car started up just fine again. Timeframe was about 14 hours from “came out of the store having it dead” to “starting fine the next morning”. Not risking anything else, I drive it right back to the dealer.
This was 12 days ago. Since then, from what I can tell, the dealer has driven it around a lot (requiring me to have them buy more gas), put it up on a jack and keep it running, starting it up/turning it off repeatedly, and even had a tech take it home overnight this week. On Day 2 (last Wednesday), they were able to get it to fail, but before they had all their diagnostic equipment set up, the car was back to normal (started fine). I’m not sure of the timeline though, between fail and unfail. In the 10 days since, they have been unable to reproduce the problem. From the sounds of it though, it doesn’t seem to be a lack of effort on their part, and they seem generally stumped as well.
Is it not turning over or anything? Has it ever died while driving? I know one of the more difficult things to diagnose is an ignition switch failure or a security failure (if your car is equipped with that).
no clicks or nothing… might be ignition switch or related circuits. could also be a break or short in the circuit which energizes the starter solenoid.
When it is “dead”, there is absolutely nothing, no clicking, no turning over, no beeps, nothing. When it fixes itself, everything seems to be running completely normal. It has never died while driving (well, a few years ago it did, but we think it was due to the battery cables not being hooked up tightly enough). No security features either.
My best guess over the Internet is that the neutral safety switch has failed or gotten out of adjustment. This is the switch that has to be activated when the shift lever is in neutral or park or the manual is in neutral. You could try moving the shift lever around to different spots next time this happens with the key turned on. If the starter turns then you have confirmed that the switch is the problem.
I was going to say the same thing. Personally, I’ve noticed it in vehicles where you have to push down the knob to shift. However, I move it around, usually just to the right and back, before turning the key.
We actually tried this (moved the shift lever around, though the key was not ON) the first time when I got it towed, the tow guy recommended trying it, without success. If this problem re-surfaces, I’ll try it again with the lever out of park/neutral, with the key on.
Minor bump. After continuing to intermittently fail (once every few weeks), it finally stayed dead long enough for the dealer to hook up their diagnostics. It was indeed a failed starter.