I have no clue what I broke this time so if anyone knows please tell me. My car has been hard to start for a few days now (would either crank for a long time or not at all). the first time it happened i saw a little smoke come from under the hood after i quit cranking it. I looked everything over and nothing seemed melted but it smelled like burnt wires. The next day I noticed my starter wires were loose so I fixed that and it still didn't help. Today I tried to start it again and got the smoke and the smell but this time I saw my wire that goes from the negative terminal of my battery to my passenger fender was badly melted. I never saw a ground wire melt like that so I'm pretty much lost. Someone please help before I go nuts. Thanks.

 

I had that happen once. Ended up being an internal short in the battery. It exploded and made a hell of a mess. Burnt up all the wires connected to the starter too. Could also be an internal short in your starter or the pos wire from battery to to starter has shorted onto the frame or block.

The battery had a lifetime warr. and was brand new. All that was left to it was the bottom and a few jagged pieces of the sides. I brought it back, laid it on the parts counter and told the parts drone it wouldn't hold a charge. Should have seen the look on his face as well as other customers.

 

That doesn't make much sense to me. Shouldn't my car still start? I can't find any other wires burnt or shorted so I'm still lost here.

 

Hold on a sec, I was thinking it was your big neg. batt wire. Not the little one. In that case I would check the grounds at the back of the heads near the firewall. Good chance those ground straps are corroded away or burned off.

 

The thing that really got me now is when my starter cranks the car won't start at all now. It would at least start before. My buddy told me a story about some guy's mustang doing this and it was caused by the timing being really far off, you think I might have a bad timing chain or something? If I remember correctly the timing chain gears are nylon in my motor. Not sure but it would explain the car not even trying to start. I know i got fuel and spark. I'm still open to anything though. Thanks.

 

If you definately have fuel and spark then it should start. Have you checked for fuel pressure? Is the fuel pump priming? If the pump isn't priming, spray some starting fluid into the manifold and see if it runs. If it does then you have spark, but no fuel. You could have a shorted wire somewhere that is causing something not to work properly. Is the check engine light on when you turn the key? You may have blown a fuse somewhere.

Your question on timing shouldn't be the culprit. The timing chain gears on your motor should not be made of nylon, I've no knowledge of any motor with nylon timing chain gears. Unless you've done something to change the timing at the cam gear there shouldn't be any reason why you've got problems in that area. Start with the basics first, it might be something simple like a blown fuse or two.

 

I thank you for the ideas but keep in mind that i've done everything to my car that's been done so far including the motor swap. TRUST ME, I've already checked everything you mentioned. I believe I even said that I have fuel and spark. Anyone else?

 

Since that ground wire had burned off, did you check the grounds at the rear of the heads by the firewall to make sure they are fine? It burned off for a reason. The likely reason being it carried the rest of the load to the body of the car since some other part of the system is not intact. It's the most likely source. After you answer that, we can move on to other things.

 

As far as I can see all of the motor grounds are fine. I'm not sure if I explained but the ground that burnt was the small one that goes to the fender. I pulled the dist. cap and the rotor's still spinning so that's out of the question. The first time this happened smoke came up from down by the starter and after that happened if I lifted up on the passenger side fender the car would start fine so it seems to be a problem in that area. When I tightened the starter wires nothing was bare or burnt. I'm complely lost.

 

If anyone has any other questions Slowmaro91RS is my AOL screen name too so I can be reached through instant message here.

 

Double check the ground wires. I burned one of mine once and it scared the hell out of me. Luckily I was in the parts store parking lot, so I went back inside and bought a ground strap and a negative battery cable from their HELP section and happened to have the right size wrench in my car to bolt one of the cables to each header and then to the frame somewhere. Haven't had an issue since.

It was because when I did the engine swap I did a lot of wiring to remove useless wiring, and one of those wires was the thick negative battery cable. The battery was relocated to the back long ago, but I still had the negative cable in there as a ground for the motor. Ended up forgetting to replace it with anything when I set the new motor in. As of right now, I still have the cables just laying out in plain view, but when I get some time to work on my car, I'll move them down to the bottom of the engine so you can't see them anymore.

 

When I did my motor swap I hooked up everything Including the rear ground strap. It seemed like it was in good condition too so I didn't see a reason to worry. Since I first noticed the problem with my starter how would that tie into the ground on the battery? As far as I know the two don't really come close to eachother.

 

The starter draws a ton of power from the battery, and all of that power needs to ground through the block to the frame somewhere. That little ground strap on the back of the engine is NOT enough for all of that current to ground through.

 

Thanks everyone, I got it figured out. Aparently when my starter wires were loose they touched something and shorted out the starter solenoid. When that happened it killed the starter and also burnt the ground wire. I pulled my starter and just about everything was loose. It made quite a bit of noise when i shook it too. Got the new starter on and everything's ok. Thanks to everyone for the help and sorry for making such a dumb mistake.