I’ve had troubles now and then for years getting my car, an ‘84 T-Bird, to start. Jumper cables don’t correct it: one driver touched the jumper cables’ opposite ends together gently (the other ends were still clamped to my car’s battery), and got a spark.
Several days later, a neighbor assisted me with fixing the problem. He gouged several pieces of a greenish powdery substance from a ground wire connected to the battery’s negative terminal. He also noticed an upright fitting at the end of a rubber hose, just forward of the air-cleaner housing. It has two wires, one with green insulation and one with black, coming out of the top. The two wires’ insulation is worn and the neighbor and I suspected that the bare conductor of one wire touching the other, or the air-cleaner housing, was the problem.
Are we right?
I’m almost certain that what you’re seeing in front of the air cleaner aren’t wires. Ford used color-coded plastic vacuum lines in that era, and you might think them to be wires, but they aren’t.
Back to your starting problem. If the battery is fully charged, and passes a load test, and you have good clean post connections, the next likely culprit is the starting relay. It’s a little black device with two nutted connections and one push on connector. Follow the positive lead from the battery, and you’ll find it on a fender well. Undo the positive lead from the battery, and then clean the ring terminals nutted to both sides.
It could be a lot of things really. The components that could go out include the battery, ignition switch, neutral safety switch (on automatic transmissions), clutch switch (on manual transmissions), starter relay (solenoid), and the starter itself. Then of course there’s the possibility of a bad connection, like what happened on my 94 Thunderbird. After replacing several costly components and figuring out it was only a $1 connector, I found out the best way to troubleshoot a starting problem is to get a wiring diagram and start checking the voltage at various points along the circuit. Unfortunately all my wiring diagrams are for the 93-94 cars or I’d tell you exactly which wires to check.
Give us something to work with here.
Describe some symptoms. What does it sound like? What happens when you turn the key: nothing, a single click, high pitched whirring but no start, turning over but no start etc.
We’re pros, but ya gotta give us something to work with 
Well, I would crank the engine and hear a click, or, if I continued, nothing at all. And the electric clock would stop; and if I had the dome light on (usually because I was leaving the door open–the car was not on the street), that would go out. The horn, the window controls, the headlights, the radio–everything would go off for a few minutes; then I’d observe that the clock had started again. The electrical stuff would work–until I turned the key, then everything would stop.
The first time this had happened, two weeks ago, the car was in a filling-station lot. I kept tryting to start the car, with the hood up, then I’d get out and jiggle the red cable (positive [+] terminal) coming off the battery. After a few tries the car started and I drove it home (one-half block away).
The following day the friend helped me with the corroded ground wire.
I must point out that the fitting I mentioned in the OP–the vertical one forward of the air-cleaner housing–does have wires on top; the insulation has worn away and I can see the copper wire. I went to a Ford delaership yesterday; a Ford mechanic said that fitting is a temperature sensor, and that its wires are attached at the other end to a loom (or “harness”) somewhere below the air-cleaner.
Interesting. The air temp sensors and such on my '85 are vacuum, hence my earlier observation. In any event, that is only a 5 volt loop giving feedback to the engine control computer. It won’t prevent you from starting the car.
From your latest details, it continues to point my thinking towards poor connections at the battery post and/or starting relay.
Have you checked the starter motor itself? I’ve replaced more than one over the years as they’ve developed dead spots. It’s a totally random problem – it might be fine 1,000 times in a row and then nothing the next 500 times in a row.
It will, however, get worse as time goes on.
If it stops accessories as well, it has to be a loose battery cable or terminal. You may want to replace the terminals since they were corroded that badly. Also, check the other end of the cables. The negative cable may have loosened from the engine or wherever it’s attached.
I think your battery is shot. Just because it has enough juice left in it to make a spark when you short the jumper cables does not mean it has enough juice to turn the starter.
Batteries don’t just die by themselves though. You could be correct that whatever wires you were looking at were shorting something and draining the battery.
As others have said though, it could be a loose cable, bad connection, or a corroded cable, or it might even be the starter itself, though I would think that if it were drawing enough power to bring the battery voltage down so far that the lights dim that you would definately smell some smoke from the starter if it were shot.
If jiggling the red wire helped, start looking there, either at the wire or its connection to the battery. It might have just been coincidence that it started after you messed with the wire, but I would definately start there.
I have had the starter replaced at least once, including one time when I also had to replace the flywheel—it had a tooth or two broken off. That set me back about $400! :mad:
This has happened before I got the current battery. In fact the car failed to start (and the Auto Club truck couldn’t jump-start it) in Culver City and I had to have it towed home, about 15 miles, last July; I had the battery replaced . (Some time before that I had work done to the starter relay; personally I suspect the red cable coming off the battery, itself. :dubious: )
I’d look for signs of corrosion at the battery posts first, then at the major frame ground, then at the starter motor. It sounds as if you aren’t getting enough current flow from the battery during starting and corrosion in those spots would have an affect on the current. Loose or corroded connections between the battery and the starter is a good place to start (heh) checking.
More recently I tried to start the car–two days after I’d had it running while checking the level of ATF. Now, not only wouldn’t it start, smoke started coming from under the hood. I checked, and apparently the starter relay, fastened to the inside of a fender well, had burned out.
I replaced the relay–cost about $19.00. To simplify the matter, I sense that something is caught in the meshing bewteen the (driving) pinion gear on the starter motor, and the flywheel. Since I don’t know exactly where the starter motor is, specifically, getting the answer to this is easier said than done.
I sense that some resistance is obstructing the progress of the turning gears–and I don’t want to blow another starter relay (at that price!). The idea of turning the engine by using a socket wrench on the hext nut at the front of the alternator is attractive, and would be even more so if I had a socket head that would fit it…
Why do you want to hand crank the engine?
I had a similar problem.
My battery was fine (I got it tested) but the terminals were corroded.
Cleaning them and smothering them with Vaseline (petroleum jelly) totally fixed the problem.
I have a hunch that you have a number of problems, but I would get the battery checked and sort out the terminal and earthing anyway.
It could be one of several things, or even a combination. I’d start by thoroughly cleaning, or replacing the batt. cables and the batt. posts. That could very well be the whole problem.
If that doesn’t work then have the batt. tested, any batt. shop should be able to do it for a couple of bucks. If the batt. is OK, the next likely culprit would be the starter. If you’re a DIY’er you can pull it off and take it to a shop to be tested. Some auto parts stores will do the tests, sometimes for free.
So he can feel by hand if “something is caught in the meshing bewteen the (driving) pinion gear on the starter motor, and the flywheel.”
The temp sensor wires aren’t causing your starting problem, but they could be affecting how well the engine runs, and it makes sense to repair them.
While it’s not impossible that something is jammed between the starter and the ring gear, it’s very unlikely. There’s little or no access for anything to get in there, and it’s not something I’ve ever seen in my career. It’s also not impossible that the engine is seized or partially so, but again it’s quite unlikely and doesn’t explain the long history of this problem.
All the symptoms described point to a poor connection related to a battery cable. You need to make sure that both cables, and their connections on both ends, are in good shape. The simplest and surest (if not the cheapest) way to do this is to replace both the positive and negative battery cables. If you don’t want to replace them, clean/repair or replace the terminals that connect to the battery, and clean or replace the terminals that connect to the starter solenoid (positive cable) and engine block (negative cable). Make sure all connection are CLEAN and TIGHT. If there’s verdigris (that green stuff) in a cable, get it well cleaned out or replace the cable. The cable from the starter solenoid to the starter should be carefully checked, but its failure wouldn’t cause the loss of other electrical devices (clock, dome light) so I doubt it’s a concern.
Also check any main positive wires connected to the battery or starter solenoid. These supply power to everything except the starter motor, which includes the ignition switch and the circuit that triggers the starter solenoid.
A little note about battery cable ends connecting the a top-post battery, for everyone’s benefit. You want that cable end all the way down on the post, with some of the post sticking out past it at the top. Spread the cable end enough to get it down on there, and if necessary gently tap it down with a mallet and a 13/16" socket. Then get it tight enough that you cannot twist it on the post. The post and the inside of the cable end should be bright-metal clean - use a battery post brush to achieve this.
Here’s a quick check you can try. Turn on the headlights, if they look normal, hit the starter, if the headlights go very dim it’s probably a poor connection in your battery cables.
As I had pointed out, I sense some obstruction which caused the first starter relay to burn out–couldn’t muster enough force to crank the engine. That the engine has seized seems unlikely, since I had only had it running a few days before this all started, without incident. (And the engine has only been in there since about August 2001; it’s not the original.)
I wanted to be able to see the gears where they mesh–the pinion on the starter motor, and that edge of the flywheel. It’s frightening to comtemplate, but I wonder whether the gear teeth on either gear could have been broken…:eek:
I just now noticed the date on the original problem. I assume that has been resolved, and it’s been starting normally for the last 4 1/2 months.
“Sense some obstruction” is a bit vague, but if you want to pursue the notion you’ll need to rotate the engine with a wrench and/or remove the starter for visual inspection. Usually with that type of problem you get a vigorous clunk when the starter engages but no “ruh-ruh-ruh” of the starter and engine rotating. The smoke and failure of the starter solenoid don’t necessarily indicate that sort of problem - they could, but normal wear in the solenoid is at least as likely.
So now, with last summer’s problem fixed and the new solenoid, exactly what happens when you turn the key to the “start” position?