For some reason, my car is developing a starting problem. When I went to start it at work yesterday, I turned the key over, had power to everything, but didn't hear the fuel pump kick on, neither did the starter turn over. It was like everything had power except the ignition components. The radio came on, my fans came on, but the engine didn't even try to start. After having the hood up, jiggling some wires, it cranked. It was extremely hot yesterday, so I'm wondering if it was a wire heating up and not connecting, or if its something I'm not thinking of. A few hours later it did it again, and once again after having the hood up for about ten minutes, it cranked right up. I don't know if its cooling down and cranking, or if moving wires around is doing it.

Me and the family are currently in the process of moving, so I haven't had much time to devote to working out the problem.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

What wires are you "jiggling" when you are under the hood?


This isn't under the hood, but it could cause the car to start some times and not others. There is a system called Passkey or VATS. The pellet in your key gives off a certain resistance that goes to the Passkey box that sends the signal for the car to crank. The wires that send this signal can sometimes break since the turning of the key repetitively can wear it down over the years.

Look at this page:

www.thirdgen.org/vats_passkey_system

It's worth a shot for you to look at because it doesn't take that long to check.

 

I mainly tried playing around with the wires leading from the battery, and the wires going down toward the starter. I don't think messing with them did anything though.

Thanks for the link, I'll take a look at it.

 

After reading that page, I do believe that is my problem. My key's resistor pellet is worn down almost to being as flat as the black plastic piece that holds it. How much does replacement keys cost? Haven't been able to price them yet.

 

My wife got a key at the dealer for $15.00 or so,last year. She didn't even have to show an owner's card like years ago.

 

I've heard different things from $35-75 but I haven't actually checked myself lately. I checked about 2 years ago in South Carolina and it was $75 at Chevy dealership and they mentioned needing to program the key also, more $$.

I saw someone else replied with $15 with nothing shown for ownership...sounds shady...you shouldn't be able to get a key cut without showing ownership...Chevrolet requires the title shown showing ownership.

 

Most comman vats problem is with wires broken at the switch. If this is the case new key will not work. Easy to check. Find vats wire on the coloum and with the key in the switch in the on posisition read with ohm meter. An open is an indicator of broken wires. If this is the case you need to replace ign.switch or do the resistor by-pass. Wire broken will often times make contact again. Thats why it appears intermitinat. Easy to check do this then look at other things.......

 

How hard is it to do the resistor by-pass? I'll try to check the wire this weekend...

 

Is it still doing it? Maybe your starter is going out? I'd look at that before VATS to be quite honest.

 

it depends on the dealer to be honest, if i go up to power chevrolet they told me i just need the vin, and the old key however thorobred chevrolet tells me i need my vin, key, title blah blah.... Plus power told me $30 for a new set of keys and thorobred wanted $75. Its amazing what a 10 miles difference makes lol as far as the starting issue i thik its vats, he may have spent enough time under the hood jiggling stuff for the vats to kick back, i had it when i went through emissions, they ra my car HOT on an already hot day then shut it off and it wouldnt crank again i had to wait for 15 mins to try and it fired right up. Plus if it were his starter it should start cranking slower and slower etc

 

I'd have the battery tested too. Most places do it for Free. I went through this about a year ago, security light was not on so I guessed it was not a VATS problem. Rebuilt the starter twice, turned out to be a weak battery. new Delco fixed it right up. Then came the blown head gasket, see my other post.