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Problem cranking, once warm, once hot

smcdonaldaz

NAXJA Forum User
This problem has happened twice. The first time was about a month ago. Wife drove to work(3 miles), went in for a minute, came out and it wouldn't crank. All the lights and radio came on just fine. By the time I got there a few hours later is fired right up. and has every day since.

Second time was this morning at 6am. As she's backing out of the garage to go to work my compressor kicks on and she thinks the XJs making a strange noise so she turns it off. Realizing it's only the compressor she goes to start it and gets lights, gauges, radio but no crank. I tried jumping the starter solenoid but the starter spun but didn't engage. Still no crank. At 6:45 I couldn't get back to sleep and thought I'd see if it would start like last time after sitting and sure enough, she fired right up.

XJ is a 96 with an auto tranny. Last thing I did to it was an O2 sensor mid summer.

Ideas?
 
Fully explain "it wouldn't crank".

When you turn the key:
1 - what do you see on the dash, the normal stuff and beeps or something different ?
2 - what does the starter do, A) engage and spin the motor, B) make clicking noises, or C) absolutely nothing ?
3 - when it won't start does wiggling the gear shifter in Park or Neutral make it start ?

If the NSS is faulty or mis-adjusted, the starter will do nothing.

No juice, no start. - Begin with basic trouble shooting of the start and charge systems. Remove, clean, and firmly reconnect all the wires and cables to the battery, starter, and alternator. Look for corroded or damaged cables or connectors and replace as needed. Do the same for the grounding wires from the starter to engine block, and from the battery and engine to the Jeep's frame/body. You must remove, scrape, and clean until shiny, the cable/wire ends, and whatever they bolt to. Jeeps do not tolerate low voltage, bad connections, or poor grounds.

Once you have a solid foundation for starting, have the starter tested.
 
How did you jump it?

And what Tim said!
 
By crank I mean the engine turning over.

There's juice. As I mentioned, all the lights and radio came on as normal and when I jumped the starter solenoid the starter spun but did not engage. By engage I mean extending to meet the teeth on the torque converter to turn over the engine. I also mentioned that after letting it sit 45 minutes and doing nothing further, it started right up.

It's due an oil change this weekend so I'll check the grounds and the NSS.
 
The starter draws significantly more amperage than some lights. Poor wire connections may allow lights to light, but not allow starting. You should perform some routine maintenance on the wires and connections.

Test the starter at the auto parts store.
 
Could be the wires or the NSS.

Once I had bad battery cables causing a intermittent start problem. One night we ran into wal-mart came out in less than half an hour it wouldn't crank (radio lights, everything looks full power so it wasn't the battery itself.). Thing is during the day it do fine going to work and coming home after 9 hours in the parking lot. New Batter cables fixed it. The Battery cables that went bad were only a few years old if I remember right, it was back when I got my first XJ (a 5 speed) and was doing a ton of little repairs to make it reliable.

NSS and starter switches (in the column?) could be the problem too.
 
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