Starter let me down

So this happened yesterday...












I had the starter for about 11 months with no problems and then yesterday I stopped at the gas station for gas and went to start it up when I was done filling up and Boom.

This was supposed to be a heavy duty starter for all Chevy Small Blocks. It was a re-manufactured unit from Advanced Auto.

This issue resulted in this...





This is the second time I have found my jeep on the back of a tow truck due to a starter issue.

The only consolidation for all this is that Advanced Auto took it back and replaced the starter for free.

Anyone have a brand of starter that they prefer for Chevy 350's. I think I need to find a more reliable one.

Bump...

It has been 5 months since I installed the replacement starter on my Scrambler, and I think this one has crapped out on me as well. I am having the same starter issues I had with the last one before it exploded. I need to take it off and see if the housing for the starter tip is cracked.

With that being said, I am done with this type of starter. What starters are you all using with your Chevy V8's?

Have you ever checked your timing? I'd put money on you having kick back from either over advanced timing or noise in the ignition system. Blowing off the nose cone is a typical outcome for that-

mysunnshine said:

Have you ever checked your timing? I'd put money on you having kick back from either over advanced timing or noise in the ignition system. Blowing off the nose cone is a typical outcome for that-

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That never occurred to me. That is something I will need to check.

What would the "noise in the ignition system" consist of? I have never heard of that.

What do you have for an ignition system?

I've had that happen with Ford starters if the mounting bolts are a little loose, but Chevy starters mount differently so I think that is not as likely in this case.

mysunnshine said:

What do you have for an ignition system?

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Standard as far as I know. I will need to dig into this more.

I have a feeling that the timing is going to be the culprit from what I am reading.

thanks!

Are you related to
mhinchliffe

I just replaced mine AGAIN! Made it 6 months on this one. I'm going to have a peek at the timing and see what that reveals. Mine sounds like it needs a shim although you can't shim it...? Hmmm...
I will report back

OGRES said:

Standard as far as I know. I will need to dig into this more.

I have a feeling that the timing is going to be the culprit from what I am reading.

thanks!

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Large cap HEI, small cap HEI, MSd, etc?

I've got a DUI on my 4.2L.
If Sunshine say timing, that's my bet.

My jeep came with a Chevy 350 with a standard setup as far as I can tell. I haven't been under the hood to check it our yet. I know I don't have a MSD or anything like that.

So, it has been almost 3 months and I still haven't gotten the starter figured out yet. I have been reluctant to buy a new one because the current one is less than 8 months old.

So the current issue is that I have taken off and put the starter back on about 10 times now. Once reinstalled, I can sit in the driveway and crank her up to my hearts content. No strange sounds coming from underneath, no whine or grinding. Start up from cold with several turns of the key, starts up once the fuel is to the carburetor. Turn it off, rest, restart. No problems. I did this eight times the other day. No problems.

I start up and take a ride for 10 minutes or so, jeep drives just fine. I get home, shut it off and then try to start again and nothing but grinding noises. Obviously, the starter gear and the flywheel are not close enough together. Everything is tight. I can shake on the whole jeep by the starter and it doesn't move. I wait a few hours and uninstall and re-install the starter and it starts right back up.

So what I know for sure after the number of times that I have removed and re-installed the starter is that the starter gear has been worn down. Maybe so much that the starter is trash, but it still works just fine after a re-installation. I have had various amounts of shims on the starter to no avail. I went from two to one to none to now I have added a washer on the outside portion to kick the starter gear closer to the flywheel. None of these have been sustainable. I have read about having a starter motor brace, but my engine block does not have a place to bolt a prefabricated piece onto it like I have seen.

I am at the point to where I think I am going to go with a mini high torque starter to at least lose some weight and get rid of the nose cone style starter. Anyone have any thoughts?

Is the flex plate straight? Could the Torque Converter be "ballooning" due to fluid heat and pressure causing the flexplate to warp, thus the hot start issue? I know that's unlikely, but part of the issue sounds heat related. Is the engine ground good? Could it be losing current when hot and not engaging the bendix all the way? Spitballing here...

93_Fummins said:

Is the flex plate straight? Could the Torque Converter be "ballooning" due to fluid heat and pressure causing the flexplate to warp, thus the hot start issue? I know that's unlikely, but part of the issue sounds heat related. Is the engine ground good? Could it be losing current when hot and not engaging the bendix all the way? Spitballing here...

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I think those are all very good questions, but I think my problem is just a crappy brand of starter without a starter brace and crappy starter bolts that didn't fit quite right.

I went ahead and ordered the mini high torque starter. I will have it this week. I think that is going to help me out a lot. I do think my timing may be off as well, that is something I am going to check once I can get it started reliably.

UPDATE

I got the mini high torque starter installed and I am kicking myself for not doing it sooner. It is so much better than the standard starter I had PLUS it is about 1/3 the weight.



We will see long term how it goes, but so far so good.

I have never seen one installed. It bolts up well ?

Belizeit said:

I have never seen one installed. It bolts up well ?

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It bolted right up perfectly. I did have to figure out which set of bolts holes to use, but that took about 10 seconds. I ended up using one shim to get a good mesh with the flywheel.

This starter definitely sounds different than the one I had. It is much healthier sounding and a whole lot quieter than the other one too.