ok i took my car to the shop because sometimes it wont start....not everytime but every now and then it wont start. he tells me its a butterfly switch in the ignition. Ok here's what its doing...when i put the key in and try and start it the radio,head lights and everything turns on like normal but it wont crank at all.....its just dead. no wierd sounds or anything. It still has full battery power but just wont turn the starter or anything. Could a switch in the ignition be the problem?

 

Does it click at all when you go to start?

I beleive the system is like this

key switch
starter relay
solenoid
starter

Check power at the solenoid to see what your getting. If good power, its your starter, if low or no power, check the relay, and so on.

I had the same problem in my car. I could hotwire the power to solenoid and the car would spin great. I was losing voltage somewhere between the key and starter, buuuuuut I just wired up a push button.

 

No clicking or anything, it just wont start. I can wait for ten or fifteen minutes and it will start right up. It sounds like starter.

 

I don't think its the starter, check the voltage at the starter and voltage at the solenoid power, while someone turns the key.

 

do you have one of those chips on your key?

 

i was having probs with my firebird for a while. it would brand new battery and alternator, but at times the thing would just be completely dead and i couldn't understand it.

turned out being a positive lead from the battery was rubbing against the power steering pulley, which rubbed through the insulation, allowing + to ground through the pulley/shaft/bearing at a slow rate as well as pissing off the ECU..

rerouted it, ziptied it to the cooling fan support spar.

 

My 84 T/A does this. It'll start fine 15-20 times and then I turn the key and... nothing. I've got full power to everything and if I jump it, it cranks right over. I turn the key off, then back on and it'll either start or not. If it doesn't, I turn the key off again and usually by the third start it runs fine. I've had the starter rebuilt twice and the solenoid swapped out as well. I'm at wits end trying to figure this out.

 

Well on a wrecked camaro we have, the starter wouldnt start the engine up. it would just click like it was stuck. I had a buddy of mine tell me a trick to try and hit it while he started it up. well I hit it and he started it and it turned out to crank right over. 4 starts later the starter went out.maybe its an out starter

 

LOL Now that is a good example of heat-soak...haha My Camaro (long tub headers) would do that on long trips...I'd stop to get gas and then when I went to get going again...nothing. I reach down with a small hammer and hit the solenoid and bam...start right up.

 

took it to the shop a while back and found out it was the alarm system. They said the alarm system was killing the starter in my car so i couldn't turn it on. so thats cool.

 

Lol, I'm surprised no one said that. Those things go bad often.

 

lol nice lmao.

 

yea i've been dealing with this for i dont know how long and come to find out its the stupida$$ alarm. Sucks. But at least its fixed. I actually just diconnected my alarm a couple days ago because my keychain alarm button isn't working so everytime i would get in my car the alarm would go off and it would just stay on while im driving lol. So now i dont have an alarm.

 

What kind of alarm system do you have? I was thinking about getting this viper one installed..

 

I have no clue. Didn't take the time to look. I'm pretty sure its the stock alarm system for it...if it came with one. But half the time the alarms system didnt work anyways so it wasnt that great.