So my car is back in the spotlight with another problem... About a week ago I parked my car at work after lunch and it wouldn't start when I came out to leave at night. Started just fine to go to lunch, but was dead after work. It was acting funky too... When I turned the key to ON, the fuel pump wasn't always priming and sometimes the lights would be dimmer than other times. Every attempt to start it didn't even turn the engine over or make the solenoid click. Just seemed to pull a lot of charge from the battery. My fuel pump would cycle after the attempt and some lights on the dash would turn off during the attempt. I finally broke down and asked for a jump from a girl in the parking lot... When I tried to start it, it acted the same way. I turned the key on and off a few times until I heard the fuel pump prime on one of them.... tried then and the car started right up. A few days after that, I started the car just fine at Erik's Bike Shop in Dinkytown and my girl friend and I drove to my house in NE. I was only at my house for about 15 minutes; and when I went back out to my car to leave, the thing was dead again acting the same way as it did at work before. I was in a hurry and on a little hill so I just did a quick push start and it fired right up. Braap! I was gone. : ) Tonight, I drove to volleyball and when I got out from my game the thing was dead again! Lucky my roomate had driven too, so we tried to jump it with his car. Hooked everything up, car seemed right every time I turned the key to ON, but nothing happend when I tried to start it. Not even a click..... maybe a slight click, but not nothing real loud. The wierd thing too, was that my speedometer was moving while my roomate reved his car a little during starting attempts. I don't know how that connection is made??? Eventually I gave up and push started it again. Fired right up easy. When I got home I was banking that it would start if I tried after parking.... Every other time it wouldn't start, I would drive it for a half hour at least and it would start right up the next time I tried. Seemed be a random event. So I did some searching and heard people talk about.... 1 - bad leads on your starter 2 - bad starter in general 3 - clutch engagement sensors 4 - bad ground 5 - and bad battery I thought the clutch engagement sensor was interesting so I went back out to the car to do some investigation. I checked to see if the car would act different if I pushed the clutch in and tried to start it versus having the clutch in. My idea is that that would tell me if my sensor is doing "something". Sure enough, the sensor looked fine and it acted different when the clutch was engaged versus disengaged. With the clutch pressed in the car would re-prime after each start attempt and it seemed like it was pulling far more from the battery with the clutch in versus out. That tells me that the sensor is sensing "something". This has gotten ridiculously long, yes, but I don't want to leave anything I noticed out. Possibly make this more efficient. ha ha Car......02 wrx, 97k miles, recently swapped new shortblock, relatively recently upgraded turbo and supporting mods, always in the garage, always a project. Anybody have any ideas what this sounds like???? Thanks for any help in advance.
Dimming lights is usually a battery/connection/wires. Start at the battery and make sure that all those connections are good. Use some baking soda and water to clean everything up if need be. From there I would start checking all the gounds in the engine bay. Maybe you missed a body to motor ground strap or something like that. The clutch sensor will give you more of a work or it doesn't work, kinda thing. That should not make your lights dim at certain times. Russ
What ground runs in the same wire loom as the starter power? I may get flamed for this.... wait, yes I will, but.... that ground hasn't been connected to anything since the day I bought the car. It has been hanging free down near the steering shaft for the past 3 years, ha ha. I didn't disconnect it in the first place and it has never caused any problems...that I knew of. I have always ment to check someone elses car to see where it is supposed to ground to, but I have never gotten around to it. Where does that ground, ground to?
my thoughts too. But if it were just a bad battery connection, it would start right up when jumped. it's definitely a loose connection somewhere, not a sensor or solenoid. yes, that big ass wire that runs along next to that positive cable should be bolted to a bracket on the starter. It's a major ground. definitely hook it up, although if it hasn't caused problems before, I'd be inclined to say that it isn't your problem, but certainly isn't helping, so start there anyway. next I'd check the wire that goes from the positive battery terminal to the bottom of the fuse box. Sounds very much like the problems that Dan was having with his Legacy, turned out to be corrosion on the fuse box itself.
That's a main engine ground that should be attached to a flange on the starter bolt that goes through the trans into the block.
Thanks for the advice guys. I am going to hook the ground up ASAP. It is a bad connection to the starter or the wire going to it. I have played around with it now and I can get the car to start by wiggling that wire around between starts. I just take my "jack crank rod thing" and reach down into the engine bay to give the wire a little nudge here ane there. Seems to do the trick. I checked the actual connection last night and the nut was tight on the starter..? I can't imagine that the cable itself is going bad, but who knows. Maybe the starter has a worn out connection. I will look into all of this when I get the chance. At least the problem has been narrowed down significantly. It shouldn't be too bad to fix from here. Thanks for the all the advice.
