Hey guys, so my starter went out the other day, and I installed the new one. Now the car wont start, nor will the lights turn on. Is there anything specific that I could have done? I jumped the battery and the car started up and when driving it, everytime i clutched the radio died. Any help?
thanks!!

oh and it's a 1988 vert

 

I would have said you did not bolt the neg cable to the bellhousing.

But you said you jumpered the batt and drove it soooooooooo I wonder a bit.

I always assume a lot...........like the batt cables are attached to the battery and stuff like that. Even if the MAIN fuse was blown the headlights would still function. Got me what's wrong.

 

how did you jump the starter and were you sure that the starter was in fact faulty before tossing in a new one? the starter circuit itself usually is more prone to issues than the starter is.

afterwards i would also assume that the car isn't grounded properly or you somehow have the battery cables reversed, managed to jump the car off the battery and it is working off the alternator(longshot but you missed something big).

 

To be honest I not entirely positive the old one was trash. It gave out while cranking the car, so I just assumed it burned out. To jump the starter, I just connected a screw driver to two metal pieces where the wiring goes.
Before the cluster lights would turn on with the key in, but now just nothing.
It's dark now, but tomorrow I'll work on it some more

 

Positiive and negative cables connected arsebackwards. Like the neg is on the positive post of the starter SOLENOID and the pos cable is attached to the bellhousing.

Only one cable goes to the starter solenoid. Two posts on the solenoid can accept the positive cable. You have to put it on the right threaded stud or it won't work right.

The negative cable attaches to the bell housing or the long starter attach bolt.

I don't count the small 18ga wire that goes to the starter solenoid as a CABLE. So don't confuse it with my words above when I mention CABLE.

 

I thought that the piece with that big rubber end is the pos cable, which goes on the start, and the other cable goes on the stud on the bellhousing?
Sorry for sounding nooby,
but thanks for the replies!

 

i believe he simply arced the spade connector leading to the starter to ground somehow and blew out the ignition fuses or ignition switch itself.

if the starter bumped over with a screwdriver in the forward direction and actually ran then the battery cables were installed correctly at the battery, could be on the incorrect lug on the starter but it sounds like there is now an issue with the ignition circuit as well with the dead gauges, funky radio, etc.

the one with the boot with the connector on it is positive, the bare metal ring is the ground which bolts to the top starter bolt. some rebuilt starters do not have the solenoid bolted on with the polarity in the correct location when you bolt the starter in, so it may be on the far side of the starter now, switch it to the other lug and try it again. still doesn't seem to explain the other issues.

 

Sounds like you did it right. On the solenoid are two threaded studs, either of which will accept the cable. BUT the cable needs to go on the stud that does NOT have a wire already going to it. The wire I talk about goes from a threaded stub to the guts of the starter. Again, you do NOT want your large cable to attach to THAT threaded stud. It goes to the other threaded stud. if memory serves.

Car jacked up out of gear.........................remove the trigger wire. The small wire. Touch the screwdriver shank to the small terminal and the other end of the shank to the LARGE cable attached to the starter solenoid. Starter should turn over. Try that out.

Something is really wrong with no headlights. I assume batt is charged up. Make sure.

This stuff is pretty easy. Batt positive post has two cables on it. Smaller goes from that post to the front of the engine bay fuse box and is bolted on with a 10mm bolts. The bolt head is hiden under a rubber flap. That feeds power to the engine bay fuse box. The headlight fuse should have power then............power leaves the fuse box and goes to the headlight relay and sits there 24-7. Then you turn the headlight switch to ON. That act puta a GROUND on the headlight relay which now pulls in and feeds the headlights. Even if the assy does not come up the headlights still light up.

IF you have a meter..............pull a fuse out of theengine bay fuse box and see if there is batt voltage on one of the two blades for that fuse. Or heck, see if the batt is fully charged up or not.

Neative cable at the starter area is black/yellow the last time I looked. Goes on starters long attach bolt.

 

Post #40 in the link shows the pic of the starter but it shows the "incorrect" wiring. Post #41 explains how it should be "properly" wired.

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...=starter+satch

 

Even if both large cables were sitting in thin air the headlights would work according to my way of thinking. the large gnd wire also branches off and gnds at the left front strut tower so there would be a gnd even if the gnd cable isn't connected to the bell housing.

Starter would not work but headlights would. So that makes me wonder about the condition of the batt and or the cable attachments AT the battery.

 

yep, i'm gonna say we could use pics of the battery and starter wiring to help in seeing what's going on with it.

battery cable negative is at the front of the car, positive is towards the driver in the engine bay. installing the battery backwards usually results in blown fuses followed by many many strange irregularities.

 

Oh man, I should have clarified. When I said the lights didn't turn on, I meant that the interior cluster lights lol I was just trying to imply that the battery wasn't even working before I jumped it

okay I'm not home right now but when looking at this picture, I dont recall playing with the circled wire. Is that the positive cable from the battery?

btw, not my car. pic taken from the thread linked to above

 

Thick cable circled is the battery positive cable.

 

both the wires in that picture:

the thin Black/Yellow wire is the ignition switch wire, it tells the starter to activate.
the thick solid Black wire with the rubber boot(not pictured) is the battery positive wire, it has a 90 degree bend on it.

the black wire poorly taped up is the ground wire which should be bolted to the upper starter mounting bolt.

if the dash lights aren't coming on i'm going to assume that you have a blown fuse for the ignition circuit which feeds power to the accessories or a faulty ignition switch.


the position of the battery wire on the starter solenoid should be irrelevant, generally the wire off the starter motor is attached to the lug closest to the transmission side and the battery positive wire is attached to the furthest lug so that the battery wire isn't near the transmission as it can ground out and cause a fire. both those wires simply have to be on opposite lugs, if they're attached to the same one then the starter will constantly spin. just ignore the negative cable completely until you are mounting the starter to the transmission.

 

I'm inclined to think you probably installed the starter right from your words earlier about the cable. I attached a jpg out of the manual that shows the pos cable going to the correct threaded stud.

I'd bet the problem lies in the area of the battery attachments or cable from batt to the engine bay fuse box attachments.

 

Yeah from the looks of it, I installed it correctly. Tomorrow I'll check out my cables and see whats up!

Thanks so much guys!

 

All relavant to the subject.

 

^wuuut??

Okay I'm at school now, but I'll take a look when I get home. Here's a basic recap for anybody else reading the thread
-Starter died, and installed a new one
-After installing, car didn't start and dash lights don't turn on
-Jumped and it ran beautifully
-While driving, everytime I clutched in, the radio died
-Shut car off and now won't start!
-Help? lol

 

Ok. I thougth the headlights did not work. If the headlights do work then the batt IS feeding the engine bay fuse box.

Questions like "do your headlights work" may seem irrelevant but have a purpose. It determines whether or not the batt pwr is getting to the engine bay fuse box and in turn the batt bus in the interior fuse box. Lack of headlights also means probable and almost certainly no power to the ignition switch which in turn supplys power to the Start circuit.

So........do you have Any lights at all? Anything at all working? Headlight assy's pop up when light switch is put to On?

Key to ON......do the wipers work? This determines if power is getting to the interior fuse box via the ignition switch and Also if power is available AT the ignition switch for the start circuit.

 

^ and check the Illumination fuse in the interior fuse box.

 

and check the spade connector to the starter with a voltmeter, should read 12v when turning the ignition to the crank position if it's still not turning over.

 

Yeah none of the lights turned on at all. I took a look at the battery terminals and my positive terminal was a tad loose, and upon inspection I noticed it had this white/yellowish flake all over it. And the wires are covered in it also. I'm guessing that could also hinder the battery's performance?

 

HAH! yeah you aren't getting anywhere with your battery cables looking like that. if you have enough length, you can get a good shop to re-lead/solder a new terminal on. Excessive corrosion at the terminal will cause all sorts of weirdness.

 

Not real pretty.

The smaller of the two cables on the pos terminal carrys the batt power to the engine bay fuse box. It connects to that box in the front/middle of the box and the fastener is under a plastic flap (stk install).

That feeds the fuse box in the engine bay battery power and via the headlight and retract fuses the front headlights.

The BTN fuse in the engine bay feeds batt power to the batt buss in the interior (top row of fuses there only).

Headlights should turn on when the batt and connections are good. No key required. Just headligh switch to ON.

IF you still have nothing with a good connection on the batt and good connection at the front of the engine bay fuse box........................go to the left front strut tower. Now on the inboard side of that tower, and about a foot down, you should find a black cable bolted to the frame. That cable is connected to the batt neg terminal. IF that cable is there, there is no reason on earth the headlights don't turn on (or any elect device that is batt power only with no key requires).

IF someone in the past has replaced the LARGE neg cable on the car and chunked the old one........then that small cable below the left front strut tower may not have been replaced and that might explain things to some extent.........but if the large neg cable that goes from the batt to the starter/bellhousing is installed....even the ommision of the small cable at the bottom the left front strut tower would not matter.
Still no lights/action anywhere??? Try swapping the batt with a known good battery.

Still no power anywhere??? IF those fuse are good in the engine bay fuse box there is NO reason for that to happen.

Your right. It's more than just a new starter installation causing you problems. And it's not a lack of power to the igniton switch etc....cause even if that were so you'd still have headlights and stop lights and tail lights and interior lights.

 

Well I cleaned up my cables and replaced the terminal and BOOM it started lol

Thanks everybody! I guess sometimes we all just overthink some things