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Tristan, just for sh|ts and giggles, swap the IAH relay with the GPR and see how it goes. The Trombetta is a nice GPR that has served many of us very well for a long time, but anything made or designed by humans can and will fail at some point.
If the IAH relay fires the GP's just fine, swap the Trombetta back in and see if it goes back to a "no start".
Turns out, my batteries are 3 years old. I've had my truck longer than I thought. It feels like it was just the other day that I bought it. It doesn't feel like it's been 3 years. Anyway, the passenger battery ground was loose. Well it was tight but I could just grab it and twist it and it came off. Same thing with driver side positive. Tight but able to twist it and pull it off. These terminals that I have are junk. Somebody replaced them and this is what was on the truck when I got it. It does not hold this many big cables worth a crap. Also was able to grab my starter wire and wiggle it and pull it out of the clamp which is most likely due to having so many cables going to such a small terminal.
Your pictures made me cringe.
The cheapest way to fix your problem, in my opinion. Is to replace your starter and battery cables..
You can go the DIU method or purchase pre made cables from a reputable company like I did.
. I am at work, so I can't look up the company I bought them from. You can PM me and I will post later tonight.
. As a preventative measure I would replace your cables. Even if you spend 6-8 hundred dollars on new batteries, you still have a weak messenger delivering your amps when needed for starting these beasts.
If you can't spend any cash right now, at least spend a hour or so and clean all connections, especially at the starter. Don't forget to disconnect both batteries first.
From the looks of this I assume this is not the original OEM starter cable. But this is what I have going to the starter. I'll try to post pictures of the mess up in the middle of the cable in a little while
Your pictures made me cringe.
The cheapest way to fix your problem, in my opinion. Is to replace your starter and battery cables..
You can go the DIU method or purchase pre made cables from a reputable company like I did.
. I am at work, so I can't look up the company I bought them from. You can PM me and I will post later tonight.
. As a preventative measure I would replace your cables. Even if you spend 6-8 hundred dollars on new batteries, you still have a weak messenger delivering your amps when needed for starting these beasts.
If you can't spend any cash right now, at least spend a hour or so and clean all connections, especially at the starter. Don't forget to disconnect both batteries first.
Just because a relay clicks, doesn't necessarily mean that it's making good contact inside and it sounds like that is your case. At least you got it running and could use it without too much delay. I'd swap it out, like Sous says and get another one if that does the trick. The way those solenoids work is there is a large washer inside that gets pulled against the two lugs and makes contact when activated. Over time, the washers pit and don't make good contact but I don't know what would cause a fault right out of the box. 12V out of the lug does not necessarily mean high amps are making it through.
Piggybacking on what Mark said in his post, I am providing some visual aids. These are the pictures I took in March of 2021 when I had an abnormal GPR condition.
Like Walleye said, seeing voltage isn’t the same thing as passing current. Someone on here (Cody maybe?) has explained a better way to check a GPR (resistance through relay maybe) but I don’t remember the details.
I’d either try crossing the GPR or swap to the AIH relay for a few mornings to confirm your results.
One thing I found out within the last few days, is that that model Trombetta it’s only a 25% duty cycle rated relay.
Has a 6 minute on time rating per trombetta which is more the sufficient for a glow plug relay IMO. If you can't grt it started in 6 minutes you have bigger issues. lol
There are quite a few FTE'rs running the same Trombetta relay Tristan is and have been for years without issue. I have this relay and manually command the GP's on for 10 - 15 seconds during a cold start up.
In my humble opinion, he has a failed GPR or an intermittent wire issue between the GPR and UVCH.
My possible early failure of a GPR could be due to when I had my injectors firing into the GP harness. I already have the valve covers off so I am going to replace the glow plugs. One thing I noticed immediately after removing the valve cover was, the doorman gasket side wires did not click onto the glow plugs properly. Well some of them were still on but two out of the four were unplugged. They must have rattled loose.
