I am away from home at a campground in a neighboring state but, at least, I have a friend in the next site with a vehicle that works. I have few tools with me.

I had old batteries when I left home but they worked fine. It's colder here and the first morning was a no start, acted like the batteries were too low to crank. I was disappointed but not surprised. We tried connecting jumper cables with no difference. While that didn't make sense, I guessed that maybe a battery was REALLY very bad and that didn't really sound right but....

We went to town, bought two new batteries at WalMart and installed them.

Nothing changed. Still no start, just the sound of a "wanna start" with about 1/2 crank of the engine. "Dang, one of these new batteries must be bad!" but I had no way to tell which one. So I disconnected both negative cables to isolate the "bad" one, and we went to town to get a voltmeter.

With the voltmeter, both batteries were fully charged. I connected the negative cables and the truck started like it was new.

Today, back to the same no-start. Batteries are still showing fine. Starting to seem like a cable problem, I'm thinking?

Since the problem went away after both negative cables were disconnected/reconnected it seems like an indication of a problem with the negative cables or connections. I haven't tried that again because I don't want this problem at a fuel stop on the way home so I need to figure out the actual problem and fix it.

Does anybody have any ideas or suggestions?

Phil

 

Do you get any codes?

 

Sounds like a high resistance in one or more of the cables. Do a voltage drop test on the cables while cranking and you'll be able to isolate which one. Check for corrosion or broken connections at frame and engine block grounds and the batteries.

 

No codes.

It just acted like dead batteries... an "almost crank". And since my batteries were old ... And since I don't drive it often enough to really keep them charged ... It was an easy assumption of batteries. But even a jump wouldn't do better.

But then an hour later it starts fine.

I got ahold of a shopowner that owns one and he said "bad starter". Hit the starter with a hammer while someone has the key in the start position to verify. I didn't need to, it started today just fine and I didnt shut it off for 7 hours and we were home and the truck is on the ramps.

Now, since I'm replacing the starter, and I don't use rebuilt, what's the advantage, if any, of the gear reduction starters?

Phil

 

the gear reduction starters will have more torque to crank the high compression engine over. Hop over to the 99-03 7.3 diesel part of this forum and look for a thread by Sous near the top. Should be in the first few pages. He just did batteries and a starter on his and was happy with it. I don't recall what he went with but it did the trick and doesn't slow crank anymore

 

Thanks, afm! Found the thread, watched the video Sous posted. Answered my questions and more that I hadn't thought of yet.

Phil

 

no problem, glad it helped!