Gen 2 Intermittant Starter Problems

Thanks Jimnist!

Where did you buy the contacts? Parts house just offers starter.
Brian

So as some of you know, a common problem with our Gen 2’s is an intermittent starting problem. You get a click but no crank despite having a healthy battery. One of the most common causes are worn starter contacts. It’s actually a common problem with many Nippon Denso starters that have been around for a while. The battery side (facing you) contact gets worn, as if it’s been machined – otherwise it looks fine.

1) First, disconnect the battery terminal. My rule is ‘negative is always the first to come off and last to go on’.

2) Undo the bolt holding the battery in place and remove the battery and plastic tray underneath. Okay, now you may be able to jump straight to step 5 and start attacking the starter (which is what i first tried) but ended up doing these extra steps because i couldn't get the starter out.

3) Undo the two bolts holding those brackets together. Manoeuvre is away as best as you can without fully removing it.

4) Disconnect the main harness from the 3 clip attachment points. Last one is somewhere behind the battery. I'm sure you'll find it

5) Undo the nut holding a wire to the starter and disconnect the plug. You'll have to remove the plastic cover. It pops right off.

6) Pull out 14mm socket and undo the bolts holding the starter on. There’s one on either side.

7) Once the bolts are out, take the starter out.

8) Undo the 3 screws holding the solenoid cover on.

That's not what you want.

And again. As you can see, my contact some how ended up on an angle and was only contacting on the very edge. This caused frequent starting problems - maybe once a week/fortnight.


9) Undo the two 14mm nuts holding the contacts in. Be careful, they’re real easy to round. You can get new nuts if you wish, but I just reversed them lol. On the side facing away, the one with the large insulated wire, you'll need to undo the nut holding the wire on before you can get to the 14mm nut. I think it's a 10mm or a 12mm.

10) Take the spacers, washers and o rings off. Make sure you remember how they came off because you’ll have to put them back on the same way.

11) Slide the new contacts in and re-assemble. On the battery side’s (facing you) contact, you don’t need to fully engage the contact into the end of the stud – when you do up the nut it will slip into position.

That's what you want.


12) Put everything back together - assembly is the reverse of installation. I’d advise on putting a light smear of grease on the plunger’s rod.

I should note that my plunger was a pitted on the contact side but i didn't bother replacing it.

 

Thanks Jimnist!

Where did you buy the contacts? Parts house just offers starter.
Brian

http://www.startercontacts.com/

I bought from him and did the install and haven't had any issues since. Been about 5k miles now.

 

Alt fuse ?

I never rebuilt a starter, but after replacing the starter 3times, my Alt fuse blew.
After replacing That, I never had a problem again with starting. The fuse bolts in, so it does
NOT pull out. Wires a bit grungy and rusty too. Checked all the other engine grounds as well,
cleaned them if rusty.

Worth checking out as well ?

Regards;
-----------------------------------------

 

Thank you for this tutorial -- it was a huge help for me. I was having a similar intermittent starting problem with the symptoms you described (clicking sound when turning the key, but no crank from starter motor).

I thought I'd add my notes to the discussion:

1. I had enough room to remove the starter motor without removing the battery or the harness. I just disconnected the battery (negative first, then positive -- reconnect positive first, then negative) and went straight for the starter motor.

2. I ordered my starter contacts from LarryB (http://www.startercontacts.com is now http://www.fostertruck.com/auto-starter-parts.html ). I spoke with him over the phone and he stated that my Densmo starter needed contact #56 for the motor side of my Denso starter and contact #61 for the battery side. The battery side faces towards the front bumper of the car. The battery side contact also has a wider surface area. Here are the links for the products:

http://www.fostertruck.com/starter-solenoid-contact-for-denso-starter.html

http://www.fostertruck.com/starter-solenoid-contact-for-denso-starter-1052.html

These contacts more or less matched up what I removed from my starter. I noticed that both of your contacts looked more like my #56 contact.

3. The wear and tear on my contacts was a bit different than the wear and tear on your contacts (see photos below). It seemed like dirt or grit somehow got into my starter and fouled up the surfaces of both the contacts *and* the underside of the copper ring on the plunger. I know the previous owner of the car had a shop rebuild his starter -- maybe they didn't do too clean a job of it... I didn't buy a replacement plunger from LarryB (probably should have, but they cost more than the contacts), so I just took a wire brush to it and sanded down the rough surface as much as I could.

Original contacts (rough surface):

Original plunger underside (rough surface):

New contacts installed:

Plunger wire brushed and fine grit sanded:

Re-installed the starter motor and the car started up great. Haven't experienced a recurrence of the start-click-no-crank issue yet. The whole job took about 45 minutes to do -- it was a piece of cake with the detailed instructions provided in this post.