Check your battery terminals and the connections at both ends of your battery cables. Make sure they're all clean and tight. You have enough connection to get "full voltage", but the click and no start tells me you don't have enough connectivity to carry the current your starter requires.
Agreed that a weak high current (150+ amp) circuit is usually the one where the driver hears a click & then nothing.
And for the reason you stated. The only reasons I went on to describe the
control circuit is because the OP
posted this back a few weeks ago: (
"Starter Purple Wire") Same vehicle? Different vehicle? I don't know.
FWIW I've seen both the control & main power circuits cause the starter solenoid to malfunction.
****
702castillo, knowing
where the single click is occurring would help our remote troubleshooting efforts. Is the
click coming from the starter relay (in the underhood fuse block) OR is the click coming from the starter
solenoid on the starter itself?
1) As Erik shared, the *majority* of the time these symptoms are from the high-current/high power circuit
having a marginal connection that won't support the 150+ amp current flow required to turn your engine over.
2) But if that high power start circuit has been verified to be in perfect condition (all positive & ground connections)
then it's also possible that the control circuit is too weak to make the starter solenoid travel (
kick) far enough to
get the big starter contacts made > engine starts turning.
Starter solenoid theory for troubleshooting purposes:
1) Referring to the start circuit schematic linked to in Post #6 above, the "3 PPL" wire between the Starter Relay
and the Starter Solenoid translates to a '12 gauge purple' wire. (See attached conversion table.) And the other
side of the starter relay is fed by a red 12-gauge wire from the
40 Amp Fuse 6 at the top of the page.
In other words, even the starter solenoid itself requires a healthy amount of current in order to work properly. (!)
There is a spring-loaded mechanical reason why this is so. The starter solenoid has a 2-step operation. Step #1 is to
first throw (a non-spinning) gear approximately 1" from the at-rest/out-of-the-way position to full
engagement with the matching teeth ringing the outside of the flywheel/flexplate.
Step #2: Once the teeth are fully meshed, the large power contact between the positive battery cable and the starter
motor is
now also made, and the starter gear starts to spin furiously. And if the
control circuit has enough
amperage for the starter solenoid to overcome the mechanical spring in the bendix trying to keep the starter
gear in the home position, then everything works. (15 amps? 20+ amps? It's a fair amount, but only for the
duration of cranking/few seconds at a time.)
But, if for whatever reason the control circuit is only good for a handful of amps, then this is when you get a
click at the starter...but since there isn't enough current to fully overcome the bendix spring, the travel stalls
out partway through the travel, so the 150+ amp connection at the end of the travel is
never made.
CLICK, but no CRANK.
The OP has at least 2 threads now concerning no crank problem, plus a bad purple wire connection that may
or may not be related? From reading them all, I get the feeling that he has replaced pretty much everything
in the high current side already. He also posted a couple of pics showing some PO hackery having to do with
the yellow wire between the start position on the ignition switch and Fuse 8 in the IP Fuse Block?
Not trying to overcomplicate things, but if the high current side is all set, then I just wanted to outline the
control circuit path he needs to focus on.
****
702castillo, let's try to focus the conversation into a single thread. It's less confusing, and you will get more
help that way.
And if a moderator could move this from the "Feedback, Help, & Suggestion" forum to the engine section maybe
more contributors will see this & share their experience.
