1985 f250 with a 302/c6 combo.

Having a hard time aligning the starter. It's almost like the gear doesn't want to reach the flywheel. It'll crank nice a few times and then the starter just keeps spinning. It hit a bad spot on the flywheel and made it worse. There's no spacers on the starter bolts either.

The teeth on the flywheel don't look too bad. I'm hoping I won't have to replace it. That's something I don't want to do in the cold.

Any tricks to get the starter gear up in the flywheel teeth better?

 

Are you trying to use a manual transmission starter in an automatic truck?
Are you SURE your starter is the right application?

You might check that the bendix is free to travel the whole way out, if it is correct.

BTW, it's a C6, it has a flexplate, not a flywheel.

 

Have you actually visually seen the gear not engaging the flywheel? Or are you just hearing it? If you are hearing it, then most of the time what sounds like the gear not engaging is really the one-way bearing in the bendix going bad. Inside the starter gear/bendix is a special bearing that locks so the starter can turn the engine, but it releases the other direction so the engine can't spin the starter(if you hold the key a little too long). This thing can get intermittent and not lock in properly sometimes to crank the engine.

 

Sounds like the wrong starter app. For starters (pun) are you able to match up the original one to the other one? Can you check for the correct app.. chip a tooth or teeth things will get Fubared.