I'm at Ft. Hood helping my brother-in-law move stuff before he deploys this week, and my truck won't start. Tha alternator light was coming on intermittently but it never seemed to do anything to the driveability. It was one of those things I was going to do tomorrow.

Anyway, the symptoms are:

lights come on for a few second and then the box with the fuses and relay on the driver's side starts clicking real fast and the lights dim. When I wiggled the black wire with the orange stipe at the starter relay, the lights would come on brighter as if it were loose or worn through. There doesn't appear to be any damage although the wires have a hard bend in them where they go into the relay.

I tried jumping it but it didn't do any good.

There is also a clicking noise from around the glow plug solenoid.

Any ideas, please help!!!

 

is it turning over?
if so does it have any white smoke coming from the pipe?
got about 2-300 rpms on tach while cranking?
batteries might be to dead to start. truck wont start unless pcm sees 9.6volts
jump with another car. have cables hooked up for ten minutes and jump both big terminals on the glow plug relay in the valley of the motor then crank it over.
the glow plug relay is supposed to click. doesnt mean its working though.

 

It's not turning over at all. The Wait To Start light comes on for a second and then goes off. The check engine light comes on after the WTS light goes off. I checked the battery and I have 12.6V on it. Don't I need about 13V?

 

Have You Tried To Jump The Starter Relay With A Screwdriver? Its On The Fender And Looks Like A Gpr.

 

I have tried that and it doesn't do anything. The lights dim and it clicks. I just turned the key to On and after the two minute glow plug wait, the relay started clicking real loud in one second increments. Maybe the glow plug relay is bad? Or maybe it's just not getting enough jiuce to deactivate it?

 

Hit the starter with a hammer. Sounds like maybe the starter is acting up. Even with the glow plug relay acting up, it should still turn over. I've seen a few starters act up like this, and banging them knocks them lose for whatever reason.

 

Well, embarrasingly, I took the starter relay off just to see if something was corroded or loose and now I forgot what goes where. Mostly, I can't remember where the little red wire with the big red wire goes. Does anyone know or have a picture of theirs? We're at a motel right now and tomorrow I will try to get the thing started again. Thank for everybody's help.

I will try the starter thing again once I get it put back together.

 

Why would the check engine light come on if the starter is bad? That doesn't seem to make sense?

 

I have the factory service manual so I studied it last night and firgured out where everything goes. When I hook it back up, I'll check the starter.

 

i',m goin with bad connection or toasted starter, make sure your engine ground is good

 

With relays clicking on and off sounds to me either the batterys are dead or some corrosion around the Battery terminals and or the starter relay terminals. Check your batterys with a meter and see what your voltage is good batterys should be around 11-12 Volts if they are then it would be best to pull off the battery connections and clean them with a battery brush and put some dielectric grease when you put the cables back on. Do the same for your starter relay, because it is where all the truck connections go. Check to make sure that you have same voltage at the battery + side of the relay as you do at the batteries, this will eliminate the idea of a loose or broken or high resistance cable from battery to relay. After all is clean and tight make sure the starter relay clicks when the key is turned and that you get within +/-0.1volts
on the output/starter side of the relay than on the battery side(make sure the starter wire is disconnected from the output side for that test. If all that is fine then more than likely your starter has a short either internally or in the solenoid on the starter itself. That solenoid has 2 sets of windings in it and if the pull-in winding is shorted to ground its will be a dead short causing all kinds of havoc.
I hope this helps anyone with starter problems/battery problems im in that class now so im really up to date on most electrical components PM me if anyone needs help.
-----------------------Jeremy

 

....What he said......

 

I checked all of the connections and everything was reading fine. I went to strart it and the WTS light came on with more power than usual and when I turned it to start it clicked as if it didn't have enough juice. When I turned it back ot off, a relay in the dash kept clicking and the radio, lights and power went off completely. If I turn the key to on the clicking stops, but the WTS light does not come on and the power side of the starter relay reads 6V. I am toinking I have a short, or a bad ignition switch or a blown fuse. Right now all of my lights and power are completely off.

 

This is one of those days when I feel like a complete moron. I forgot to connect the neg on the drivers side battery. It still doesn't start but now at least I have light. I'm charging the batteries off another truck and I'm going to give it a shot. i think this might work.

 

Good luck hope u get it going.
------------Jeremy