1965 C10 - won't start

[Woogeroo]

1965 chevrolet c10 truck long bed/long wheelbase

1992 5.7L/350ci motor with a carburetor & electric fuel pump

th350 auto tranny



got in the big blue '65 c10 truck and went to the store, went outside... starter would start to turn and then hang.

Called dad.

Dad showed up, we tried jumping it off with battery cables, same thing.

Tried whacking on the starter with a hammer while trying to start it... no joy.

Swapped out starter in parking lot... autozone under warranty job... oh yeah, the autozone people tested the starter on the bench thing and they said it was fine... but I swapped it out anyway.

Nothing.

double checked wires n' things... cleaned up battery terminals... tried jumping it off again in case battery was toast or drained...

no joy.

ya turn ignition and needles in the gauges flicker on, headlights come on, electric fuel pump buzzes, but no starter action.

Damn.

I'm really at a complete loss at the moment.

-W

[joe231]

Did you try jumping the solenoid?
is the Bendix kicking out?

you can also check for voltage drop in the hot cable with a meter set to DC voltage.
put one lead on the cable at the battery and the other lead on the same cable at the starter, have someone try to crank it, what your meter shows is the amount of voltage
you are losing across the cable, if it is more than one or two volts, you not getting enough through to spin the starter

[padresag]

how old are the battery cables. if you can't remember replacing them, perhaps you should check for being green and if they are green that is more than likely your problem as it is not letting the juice through. right where the cable meets the terminal ends peel back the cover from the cable and if you see green in the cable that could be your problem(both cables) . you may have to slit it length wise in order to expose the cable. this can also happen at the starter end. If that is not it just check all the wiring in your starting system and where it goes through the firewall and ignition switch
but as joe231 says try jumping your starter from the hot post to one or other of the little ones (can't remember which one) and iif it cranks over then the prolem lies behind the starter and if it doesn't crank over , it is in frt of the starter
ron

[jonzcustomshop]

there is a chance that the new autozone starter is bad too...
I have rebuilt 3 gm starters/battery cables in my gm cars in the last year. All had problems similar to what you are saying.

[greg64]

Hi Woogeroo,

Checking for voltage drop to the starter is a smart thing to do, since it's so easy. But I'll add to Joe's explanation to check the ground cable connection too, since it's just as likely to have a problem. And, make sure the meter lead is touching the actual battery post and not the cable clamp, since a lot of bad connections occur right at the battery terminals.

If that isn't it, your information on which engine and tranny you're running makes me think that you need additional shims between the starter and block. What I think might be happening is that the ring gear isn't perfectly round (nothing really is) so as the crank rotates, the ring gear teeth get closer to the starter pinion teeth (we're probably only talking about 1/32 here). But, it's enough that the whole thing might bind up. Starter pinions hanging in the ring gear have been going on as long as there's been electric starters.

Have you visually looked at the starter pinion (remove the tranny dust cover) when it won't rotate at all? Might be informative as to what's going on.

Good luck

[72lb4x4]

Not a very good description of the problem, but click grr indicates a bad ground , bad positive cable, or bad starter.

Click says the solenoid works somewhat.
Grr says the bendix is engaging the starter gear and flywheel/flexplate. So the solenoid has done its job.

Grr says that the starter isn't getting enough current to spin the motor, or its toast.

Replace the big starter cables and ground the battery to the engine block.

[joe231]

thanks Greg for the addition!

[orange66fleet]

Sounds like what happened to me in my 97 olds, I had the same problems as you and thought I had a bad starter. Then when I ruled that out I started to pull the plugs and thats when the coolant started coming out. My advice is to pull out your plugs to see if there wet.