Starter Motor Turns Over Slowly & Wires Smoke.

[Guest stuhickman]

i'm putting my exmo back together after having the engine out, last time it was working was late 2004.

 

The last couple of weeks i've been trying to get the car started, up till today the starter motor has just spun and no sign of engaging.

during the evenings in the week I took the starter out of the car and took to bits on the kitchen table, the brushes all look OK.

 

Ordered a new solenoid which came yesterday and put on the starter, Put it back in the car and still just spun.

 

Found what the problem was, the ignition wire had come loose in the wiring loom and gone through the bulkhead in to the passenger side of the car.

 

So the solenoid was not getting the signal.

 

Now the car engages when the ingnition is switched on, but i've got another problem.

 

The starter motor turns over very slowly. At the moment i don't have any plugs in the car. there was a burning smell, which i thought was the starter just getting hot.

 

But i put the plugs back in and the starter just had an initial attempt to turn the engine over and then gave up, and there was a faint whiff of smoke from the fuse wire on the positive terminal on the battery, the wire was also quite hot.

 

I have cleaned the earth strap from the battery to the top of gearbox.

 

Is the starter knackered?????

[Guest outtolunch]

It sounds more like its wrongly wired up to me, a starter motor should not be spinning unless the solenoid had pulled in, it could of course do this if the solenoid had stuck but then it would be spinning as soon as the battery is connected. from your description it could be that it is trying to start by sending all the current through the control wiring which could very quickly lead to a major burnout of your electrics. without being there it is difficult to diagnose but thing to try are with the ignition off try using jumper wires to engage the starter, also checking the voltage at the battery and the starter terminals nothing fancy needed the cheapest multimeter costing a £5 will do

[Snapperpaul]

Check you have good earths from the starter motor to bellhousing bolt

I have 4 big earth cables

1 battery to startermotor bolt

2 from startermotor bolt to chassis

3 engine block to chassis, same loction point as 2

4 earth chassis to gearbox central mounting bolt

[Guest chris brown]

Is the starter knackered?????

I would think so, providing the earth to the engine and the +ve to the solenoid have good connections and of cause the battery is good.

[Guest stuhickman]

The battery is brand new and shows good readings when checked with a voltmeter.

 

Negative side lead to bellhousing is all clean and tight.

 

I will see if i can get another starter.

[Guest allenr03]

I had a similar problem with my starter, especially when the engine had been run, almost wouldn't turn over at all. I hadn't fitted a big enough engine earth. I put a hefty one on and haven't had a problem since.