Starter solenoid problem

[Llamaguy]

1995 Eclipse GS 107,000ml manual

When the car feels like it, it runs fine. Other times it won't crank. Starter is new, battery is good and charged. Getting power to the starter. Solenoid isn't getting power the times it doesn't start, well like .2VDC. But every time we try and fix it, it works and we can't try anything. We had a code red and the idle air control valve? is bad; would that be causing this?

A bunch of People have had this problem, but most of them are on 1g cars.

Thanks

 

[luv2rallye]

You most likely have poor cable connections from the battery to the starter. I'm talking the big cables. The ends can get corroded, dirty, not tight, or partially broken (inside) where the cable meets the terminal. If there is even 0.1 ohm resistance in the path from battery to starter, it will drop so much voltage when you crank, that there won't be enough voltage left at the starter (needs to be more than 10 volts at the starter). Remove and clean both ends of these cables (and what they connect to) and battery posts with sandpaper and tighten securely. Do both the battery positive to the starter and battery negative to engine (connection to engine must also be clean/tight – this is usually to a starter case bolt). Also try wiggling the cables to check for breaks.

After doing this if it still won’t crank, measure the voltage across the starter itself while cranking. If it's less than across the battery posts themselves (while cranking), one of the cables is your problem and needs to be replaced. You can measure the voltage drop across each cable (from one end to the other) while cranking to find out which - should be close to zero. Or what’s easier is connect a battery jumper cable from battery negative to engine block. If it now cranks your negative cable/connection is bad. If not, connect the battery jumper cable from battery positive to starter positive post. If it now cranks your positive cable/connection is bad.