How do you diagnose/test a starter?

So got a call from the dealer yesterday saying that my starter and ignition switch are toast. They quoted me $900 to replace (including $250 in diagnostic fees - due to me bringing it in for electrical smoke). I asked a few questions about how they know they are both bad (without finding anything melted) and they weren't able to answer them. I don't believe my starter is toast. What kind of tests would you run in order to determine it is bad?

I'm planning on getting my jeep towed from the dealer to my house so I can work on it myself since I can't afford the $900 with a baby on the way in a couple months. I'd like to question the dealer further to see if they did their due diligence as I recently purchased a used 07 grand cherokee from them with waranty and want to consider if I want to retrn to them for service.

Any help would be appreciated!

There are two wires to the starter. One is the primary from the battery and the other is the one for the solenoid. Remove the starter and connect it to the battery with jumper cables, positive to the big post and negative to a mounting ear. Use a smaller guage wire to momentarily jum between the big post and the small one. The starter should turn. the bendix (drive gear) should extend. After removing the small jumper, the motor will stop and the bendix should retract. Smell the starter. If is smells like it is burnt. do not try and run it, it is a goner.

Do you have, or have access to, a manual? You will need it and a meter to test out the rest of the system. There is a relay in the PDC for the starter. It sends the signal to the solenoid, the key switch fires the relay. At each step, voltages can be checked.

That's a pretty steep charge, and I suspect that the dealer did not look very hard at anything. Of course I may just be out of touch with what these things cost these days, but it seems a lot just for a diagnosis.

You don't say where the smoke came from, but it makes a difference. Nor do you say whether the starter turned at all.

One basic test of a starter, if it's working at all, is to put an inductive ammeter on the battery cable and check the current draw. You can get such a meter for small money, and it sure does not cost $250 bucks' worth of labor to clip it onto the cable and crank the starter.

If you can't get a good answer from the dealer on what they did for that quarter of a thou, then you can't be sure they didn't just go on assumption, and if the problem turns out to be a bad cable or something, you'll end up paying extra for that on top of the unnecessary work.

If you're not up to testing the starter yourself, I'd suggest you take it out and go find a local auto electric shop, where such things are worked on. These folks specialize in this, and they can test it properly on the bench, and fix, rebuild or replace it, probably for less than the cost of a dubious parts-store rebuild.

As for the ignition switch, I'd wait until you're sure of the starter, then diagnose as needed. What gets checked would depend on just what is or is not happening.

I think I'd at least consider looking for a different shop after your GC warrantee expires, but perhaps I'm just an old curmudgeon.

Matthew - thanks for your response. I had started another post the day the incident happened. The details are in here (sorry at work and no time to repeat) http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1047130

I think I'm going to have the jeep tower to my mother-in-law's house and try to get some people help me fix it there.

Bring it to Autozone. They have a tester for it.

While $250 for diagnostics--with the end result of the starter-solenoid and ignition switch being bad--seems pretty steep, without knowing the dealer's shop labor rate and EXACTLY what you asked them to check on the vehicle it is hard to be too judgmental. (However, if you had brought it to me it would be "time and charges" on electrical work, especially a burn or "smoker".)

However, that would leave $650 to replace the starter-solenoid and ignition switch, and THAT is ridiculous.

Joe - labor rate is basically $100 per hour and I brought it in to them saying that I had experienced smoke coming from my vehicle while parked on the street outside from my house 6 hours after I had last used it. Upon opening the door I found smoke but couldn't identify the source. After disablign the battery, I went back to the cabin where I found the smell to be heaviest around the corner of the dashboard by the steering wheel. I also indicated that I put the terminal leads back on the battery, tried to start it and got nothing but power the interior lights and dash. Lastly, I told them when I tried to press the lock key to lock the vehicle, the horn sounded and stayed on till I removed the battery cables.

Thoughts?

I talked to the service guy today. Talked him into taking $50 off the diagnostic and will have my jeep towed to my mother-in-laws tomorrow or saturday morning. I'm going to attempt to fix it myself.

Emerscape said:

Thoughts?

Click to expand...

Your ignition switch fried and your starter is probably fine.

Thats what I'm hoping for. I read somewhere that if you have a lot of keys on your keychain it can cause issues with the ignition switch. Anyone else heard of this? My wife has a keychain like a janitor...

Emerscape said:

Matthew - thanks for your response. I had started another post the day the incident happened. The details are in here (sorry at work and no time to repeat) http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1047130

I think I'm going to have the jeep tower to my mother-in-law's house and try to get some people help me fix it there.

Click to expand...

That sounds like a good idea, and the initial starter diagnosis outlined above would be a place to start. and from there to see if you can figure out just what was smoking inside. It could be the switch, could be the wiring, and could be due either to a short somewhere or to a shorted/toasted starter solenoid. A cheap digital multimeter would be a really handy thing to get hold of here. Nowadays you can get a reasonably serviceable one for 10 bucks or less, so there's little excuse for not having one.

Do not be intimidated by starter removal and replacement. It's relatively simple, and on an XJ you don't have to jack it up or remove any other parts of the vehicle to access it. Once you've done it once, it's one of the easiest major parts to swap.

what year is the vehicle?

The starter assembly is pretty simple to test. The solenoid has two large wires (one for battery, one for starter motor) and a small wire in the center (for ignition wire). The solenoid grounds to the starter motor, which grounds to the body.

The solenoid is a coil with a plunger in the middle. When ignition power comes into the center lead, the coil is charged, causing the plunger to be ejected. When the plunger moves out, it does two things: first it moves the starter motor gear into position by the flywheel so that it can turn the motor, and second it bridges the fat wires on the solenoid so that battery power can pass to the motor. When this happens the starter motor spins up, and the gear turns the flywheel.

Simple test with everything bolted up is to run a length of wire from the battery and touch it to the small center pole on the solenoid, and see if the gear ejects and the motor spins. If that works the starter assembly is operational.

I'm sure you will be on the hook for the diagnostic fee. Even if they change the switch and starter there still may be additional problems they may find after they get it running. If I get a burn/ smoke repair I'm very thorough. I wont reconect power untill after the problem is found and extent of damage determined. It takes more time if the short is intermittent, the harness is all taped up, fully loaded with all the options, aftermarket accesories/ alarm. There is alot to check especially if there are no burned fuses, wiring damage or obvious heat damage to componets. If the tech were to diagnose the repair wrong and it was to burn the shop would be facing a lawsut.

The starter may function but load testing high due to bad brushes or a pitted armiture.

I don't know how the $650 brakes down, Maybe 250 for a brand new not reman starter, 100 for ignition switch, an hour each to install and another to reassemble the interior and road test and misc shop supplies and enviromental. They are probably not trying to screw you over just standard flat rates to replace componets. Have the service writer talk to the tech and find out what all was checked and what was found, hopefully they can help you out on the price maybe reman starter to save some too.

Simple check for the starter is to jump the terminals with a screwdriver and see if the engine cranks.

jumping the big terminals bypasses the solenoid altogether

it's a 2000 sport

This may be too broad of a question - but can someone tell how I'd go about checking the wires (other than physically inspecting). I'm not too familiar with the use of a multimeter or how to use it effectively.

Thought I'd write an update.

Got the jeep towed today and started working on it around noon. Took most of the dash apart to see what I could find and everything looked good (what a b*tch). Then deceided to remove the starter and take it to Autozone. When I removed the starter, I could smell the electical burning smell get stronger. I brough it to autozone where they confirmed that it was toast and agreed that it was most likely the source of smoke. Bought a remaned started for $160 and installed without issue (although those bolts are a PITA to get to). The jeep started up strong and ran fine. I did not replace the ignition switch as it looked good.

Question is, does it makes sense that the starter could smoke like it did after sitting idle for a few hours? Should I have replaced the ignition switch?

I keep getting the electrical burning smell but it doesn't seem fresh. I think it might be due to the fact that I ran the heater/air and the odor still remains in the vehicle.

My question is how did smoke from the starter get inside the passenger compartment?

well, the starter is attached to the transmission bellhousing and the transmission is connected to the shifter which is inside of the jeep so maybe the smoke came through there?

I just got a Remy brand (remember Delco Remy? GM spun them off in 2004) starter at Advance for a little over $100, brand new. Real nice! Another concern, though, may well be the ignition switch. I've had to replace a few through the years (not on the Jeeps), and usually it was the contacts on the 'run' circuit that were bad. It is very important that all the power accessories that draw power through the ignition switch are OFF when you start, or turn off the engine. The contacts in the switch are small, and while they do an OK job of flowing current while the switch is on, the arcing that takes place when cycling the switch with high-draw accessories on just kills the contacts, melts the switch, and very well could cause smoke, and a fire. The contacts get coated with burnt carbon, causing higher resistance, causing heat. The biggest offender is the blower motor. Make sure it is off, or on its lowest speed when touching the ignition.
And, the aforementioned keys don't help. Just a small tag, or your remote fob is all that belongs on your ignition key.