Technical Gotta be the Solenoid, Doesn't It?

Last year, I went to a non-local Farm & Fleet, because they were the only place I could get a new bottle for my MIG. Local places were all out with “supply chain issues”. Came out, turned the key, and nothing happened. No click from the solenoid pulling in. Went back in, bought a hammer, gave the starter a “tap”, turned the key, and “vroom”. Drove home, and replaced the starter. And, bonus, now I have another hammer.

On one of my other trucks, I had the solenoid contacts fail. When that happens, you get the click of the solenoid pulling in, but then nothing. Bought the parts locally from a rebuilding shop, and repaired it myself. That repair outlasted the truck itself.

 

Back in the dark ages of the 70's, I worked for the Border Patrol in El Centro. We had about 4 454 powered Suburbans that would transport loads of illegals from Calexico to our detention facility in El Centro. If it was hot weather, the Suburbans had to sit until they were cool before they would restart. They would just grunt and not turn over well at all. I called the GM training center in Burbank to see if they had any solutions. The guy on the phone said it was easy. First, get a Ford starter relay. I asked him why was a GM guy suggesting that I use a Ford relay. His response was, "do you want to cure the problem or not?". What I ended up doing was just what Squirrel suggested. The guy explained that GM starters will heat soak and cause the plunger to swell because of the constant electrical current applied to the end with the battery wire attached to the solenoid. By using a divorced Ford relay, a starter cable, all of the wiring transferred to the Ford relay and jumpering the the start pin to the large terminal on the solenoid, there is never any constant current on the solenoid except when the Ford relay is energized. It always stays relatively cool. We did it to the a suburbans and never had a problem again. From that day until now, I wire every GM starter the same way using a Ford starter relay, a starter cable, jumping the starter pin to the heavy stud on the solenoid, where I attach the starter cable to, moving all the wiring, including the starter wire to the Ford relay. I have had guys not be able to start their cars when hot because of header heat and tried all kinds of high zoot starters to no avail. A standard GM starter and rewiring like Squirrel and the GM guy said cured all the hot start problems. I own an OT 68 El Camino that I inherented when my father p***ed away in 1990, and immediately converted it to the Ford system. Thirty three years and a half million miles, three engines of various tunes and horsepower. From low desert in the utmost heat in the summer, to Bonneville and everywhere never a grunt or hard start hot problem. And neither have anyone whose car I converted or recommended the conversion to have had any problem at all. Some of those guys had engines with enormous power and still had no problems starting any time or anywhere.

 

Yep, it works so well that when Ford went to the GM type starter with the solenoid mounted on it, they kept the on the fender solenoid as well, but instead of calling it a solenoid, they now call it a relay. It may be different, but the principle is the same.

 

But...who said something about troubleshooting it by measuring the voltage at the S terminal on the starter? That's how he found the problem...not by throwing parts at it.

 

I should have had it right off the bat. Now that I am remembering. About 4 years after the car was on the road in primer, I decided to paint it. Stripped it to body only on ch***is and painted it, cut and buffed, fenders done ready to ***emble the car. The car was sitting in front of the lift, close to the shop OH door. I went to start it and it started in reverse and ran into the closed OH door before I could get it stopped. Didn't hurt the door, but it put a hell of a dent in the panel below the trunk. ****! That put me back about 3-4 days on re-***embly. I must have bumped the NSS while taking out the interior or something. Of course, the first thing I fixed when I got it on the lift was the NSS.
Edit! Now about I think about it a little more..... That is when I didn't get it tight enough or should have used some blue loc-***e!