Yesterday, I stopped at a local Sheetz store to get some coffee. Normally I just let my truck run if I'll only be 5 min. I shut it off for some reason. I got back in it and hit the key. GRIND! No crank. Hit it again. WHIIIING. Bendix shot.

I called the wife at home (20 miles away), and told her to bring me a change of clothes (pouring down rain) and my tools. She arrives, and we went to a local Pep Boys (it was convienent). They had ONE starter left for a 300 with a manual tranny and about 5 or 6 for auto trannys. I told them I would take it and a new solenoid ($10, why not?).

Well it took me roughtly 40 min. to change out the starter, solenoid, sip on my coffee, fight the starter, ect. All this in front of the store in the parking space closest to the door (I like an audience).

When I took the old starter out, I noticed that it was painted Ford blue, and upon removing a layer of grease I also noticed it was a Motorcraft unit. I'm quite sure the PO wouldn't have spent the money for a Motorcraft replacement starter (judging by other things on the truck). So there it is:
189,073 miles on the original starter.

BTW: Does / did Ford shim their starters? I got it lined up as well as I could in a parking lot at night in the rain, however, the drive gear seems to drag slighty after firing up. Any ideas?

 

You know to answer that question you have to take into account the use of the vehicle.
If it was primarily over the road use there is a good chance that starter went that far.
An in towner go five blocks shut it off restart go five more I don't think it would make it.
Another thing that enters in is the maintenance of the unit, if you had to crank it
long or repeatedly no it won't last very long. I worked for a fleet and back in the
70's when gasoline became scarce the drivers were told that if the unit had to idle
more than 17 seconds it was to be shut off and restarted. Seems they had some
genius calculate that it took less gas to restart it than let it run longer than that period. Well the starter bills went out of sight, so did the road calls due to the failures . My view.

 

You have to line a starter up? I did'nt know that. When the starter in my '89 blew,I just took it out,and put the rebuilt one in. Went to fire it up,got a loud/strange destruction sound,and a little smoke. Hit it again and ever since then it's cranked without a hitch. Learn something everyday... I hope it's not doing any damage.

 

Well basically, I just slid the starter into the bellhousing and lined up the bottom bolt. Finger tightened it, then put the top bolt in from under the hood. It seems fine now. I also found out that Ford doesn't use shims on their starters. Chebby's do because their starters bolt to the block and they use shims to make up for block inconsistencies.

 

Kind of off topic, but I had to laugh. Earlier this year I had to do somewhat the same thing with my Porsche. The serpentine belt went bye-bye on the way to work so there I was in a stange town, in the parking lot of a NAPA auto parts store, dressed in full tactical black BDU's, with the front corner of my porsche up on the emergency jack, the spare tire under the front tire to keep it from squishing me J.I.K, putting a new belt on with tools I had to buy there as well. Boy did I get some funny looks: Redneck Repair procedure on a Yuppie car. It was hilarious! Before any of you guys get upset, I am SUCH a Redneck and dang proud of it

 

It might interest some of you that Ford must have upgraded their 300 starters in the 90's, cause when I got a new starter from Auto Zone for my 83, they said they were out of stock but the computer showed this other would work. I would call it a hi-torque unit....spins hi speed...I like it...trucks starts much quicker.