how do I find a bad ground?
 

sorry if this is a completly ignorant question but I thought that I had a starter issue, but I bought a brand new one from mazda, installed it and the car is still dying! I have a fairly new alternator (only 1yr old maybe 2Kmi on it) I have a newer yellow top optima relocated to the rear bin, and a brand new starter. I am 98% sure it is neither the alternator or the battery and 100% sure it is not the starter, how would I go about finding which ground or where the ground is that is causing this issue, is it just going through them one by one? if so I am not sure where all of them are is there some type of skematic that may be able to help? any help here is greatly appreciated.

One way is to use an ohmmeter, and measure the resistance to the battery negative from various points on the chassis, engine block, or electrical component. This works pretty well for low-current connections. For things like the starter cable that see much higher amperage, it may not catch resistance problems.

Dave

WHere is the negative cable on the battery grounded to?

What kind of starter issue are you having? Is it the "click" when you turn the key a few times?

Is the starter not turning the engine over when you turn the key to start? Does the starter relay make a clicking sound?


When I had a similar problem on a 1st gen, it was a loose ground strap directly on the starter. I just hooked up a jumper cable from the negative on the battery to the starter itself and it got me home. Probably can't do that on a fd easily, but my .02.

on my second gen the ground was straight from the battery to the starter.?!.?!

I ran a ground cable from the negative terminal of my battery to one of the starter mounting bolts. The car now starts up like a dream.

Note, my battery is relocated to the passenger side bin, and I was having weak starts until I ran that extra ground.

yeah, when it doesnt start, the starter does click but there have been a few times when it has made no noise at all.

the negative cable on the battery is grounded to the starter

Some yellow tops are just bad. The one I have in my truck has never failed and i've drained it to nothing. The one in my CRX failed every time it drained and I went through three of them. Not holding a charge won't be the starter. Should be battery or alternator, no?

I have my ground to the trunk/hatch using the bolts intended for the Bose woofer thing. You could take out the entire rear bin and find the holes for the rear seat belts and bolt in to that. For my power, my shop ran strait to the starter. I'm not sure why you ran ground to the starter. I thought the ground was supposed to be very short?

In addition to ground issues, I think a faulty clutch switch can cause starting problems And a there is also this:
https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...ighlight=click

yeah, I have dealt with the clutch switch issue as well, the little plastic clearish button looking piece on my clutch switch broke off and I have fixed it about 7 mos. ago. I am pretty sure it is a ground. I am going to start looking over everything to see what I can find. Thanks everyone for all your help. hopefully I can get this fixed soon.

have you gottin the battery test to see if it has gone bad or have u gottin the alternator tested

you ran the neg terminal all the way back up to the starter? why? you can just remove the paint from an existing bolt hole under the bin and ground the battery there.

where did you run the pos to? you need to determine if it is a voltage drop issue in the starter signal wire poor install etc...