Slow sounding starter, and cable issues

[lwillson]

Hey Guys,

One of the things I had never paid much attention to was the sound of the starter. This summer when I met up with Bill, I noticed that his truck started way faster than mine. He mentioned checking into the starter. That was July.

Now its late October, temps hovering around 0 celcius (freezing for everyone else) and I went to start the truck, and it sounded like I had 2 dead batteries.

I grabbed my jumpstarting battery, hooked it up, it spun a little quicker, but not enough to start it. I grabbed another battery, hooked it up with booster cables, spun a bit faster again, and I just held the key, and finally the engine lit.

Drove it around for the day, got the batteries charged back up, and pulled it into the garage.

Removed the starter, and threw it in the vise and disassembled it. the armature was wearing on the side of the starter (few arc marks in it) as well as being just about full of greasy old oil (probably from living half its life with a dipstick tube leak)

Since I saw the post about the buss bar conversion (ianstew Battery cable to Buss bar conversion), it always stuck in my mind that I should replace the cables as well. I have seen generators at work perk up like a new engine with a set of new cables.

So I grabbed a piece of copper, and some isolation posts, and welded some bolts to the rad support, and mounted it there




The biggest surprise was the corrosion travelling along the paper insulation under the red insulation of the starter cable. I had to cut off about 1.75" of cable to get past it. The length wasnt an issue , since the copper was lower than the top of the battery.



I also found that the passenger side ground cable connection to the engine block was loose. I am hoping that was also part of the problem.

I hope to finish up tonight, and report back with the findings.

[kramarj]

How is the copper plate not grounding out on the radiator support? And will the copper plate corrode at all being exposed like that causing future issues?

[ol_Blue97]

Looks good as always larry, i had he same issue with my starter earlier in the year and was gonna look into my cables, but then the thing just died and then i knew it was the starter.

When i replaced it i replaced it with a denso style reduction high torque starter from NAPA with a 3 year warranty and was 10 bucks cheaper then a stock replacement. ONE OF MY BEST MODS TO DATE!!! It cranks over so fast i don't think i even need glow plugs anymore. Now i don't see as cold weather as u do but u get the picture. If u havent bought the new one yet, look into a denso style!

[lwillson]

Originally Posted by kramarj

How is the copper plate not grounding out on the radiator support? And will the copper plate corrode at all being exposed like that causing future issues?

Its mounted to 2 isolators that are mounted to the rad support. There is a good coating of NO-OX on the copper and once all my connections are done, I am going to give it another coat. It will discolor some, but as long as the connections are good, thats all that matters.

Originally Posted by ol_Blue97

Looks good as always larry, i had he same issue with my starter earlier in the year and was gonna look into my cables, but then the thing just died and then i knew it was the starter.

When i replaced it i replaced it with a denso style reduction high torque starter from NAPA with a 3 year warranty and was 10 bucks cheaper then a stock replacement. ONE OF MY BEST MODS TO DATE!!! It cranks over so fast i don't think i even need glow plugs anymore. Now i don't see as cold weather as u do but u get the picture. If u havent bought the new one yet, look into a denso style!

I bought a Delco reman. It had a lifetime warranty, and new it had to be better than the old one.

How are you always 2 steps ahead of me ?

[ol_Blue97]

Haha, im no where near that, just unfortunate events cause me to dive into things as a need basis instead of a want basis.