hah my SierraEXT had the exact same issues with mysterious starting at about 45k miles. at first i replaced the negative lead head to the battery and this would solve the problem for about 2 years, then it would act up again. then finally my bf installed an enitirely new heavy ground wire and it never happened the last 3 years I owned it.

My RX7 went though the same issues with the clicking but no start, sometimes no click. It wouldpop start though. Ran through everything with the voltometer and all was fine. Replaced the starter, it didnt work. I was about to replace the ignition but I took it into a mechanic my friend suggested for one last check. Turned out to be bad grounding. Funny thing is my roommate had the exact same issues with his FD about 2 weeks earlier. After this I put in that HKS grounding kit and Ive had no worries, my headlights are a little brighter too!

Well I solved my problem. The little black plastic stopper that sits on top of the clutch peddle was worn and broke off. I replaced it with a bolt and some washers and problem solved.

/\ use a plastic interior trim piece. the metal bolt will splinter/crack the clutch switch.

for all the guys who think the ignition switch is bad just pull the connector off the neutral/clutch safety switch

put a multi meter probe in the feed side (dont know color off hand, it is one of the 2)

ground the - meter lead

turn the ignition switch to crank and see what the voltage reading is.

batt voltage 12.xx volts is good. less than 11.8 is bad (unless you are running a pos battery and that is a seperate prob. voltage should be the same as when you put the meter on your battery posts)

Did you one better, measured the voltage at the starter solinoid...7 VDC

/\ ok but what is causing the drop? with 2 switches in the line ahead of the measurement point. what is the voltage going into the clutch switch? if it is around 7 v then yea the ignition switch is bad.

I have the clutch switch jumpered out of the circuit.

Soul Annoyed
 

Can you still read the now-dirty solenoid part number?
How accessible is the starter for remove and replace? I don't have a shop manual and my head is too fat to fit under without putting the car up.
Are the manual and automatics different starter/solenoids?

Manual and automatic starters are them selves different, not sure about the solenoid it self. Jack

My car does this same crap to me all the time too. Usually if the car has been sitting for a bit I wil get "click" ot nothing at all. One really strange thing I've found is that if I put the car in gear and rock it back and foreth a few times the car will start fine???? What the hell is this about?

Rocky start
 

I have heard of that on other cars. It seems those tales involved moving the flywheel slightly so the starter would disengage and engage the flywheel gears. Perhaps in this case it moves the solenoid just enough to make a good electrical contact. Or even a better ground path to the engine.... A good detective story to follow.

R&R
 

OK, I guess I will have to put on my grubbies and get under the car; and then maybe pester a parts place about the solenoid...

There is always the wild chance that an RX7 part is accessable and easy to replace... If Mazda's maintainability engineer held sway. That happened with the cigarette lighter.

Things it is not
 

My intermittant starter solenoid response history:

Intermittantly no click, no noise; put up with it.
1) had an electrical smoking in the column, replaced the starter switch.
Still did it.

The "mechanic" mechanically said it must be a bad solenoid.
I got tired of the worry about it starting and let them replace the starter and solenoid.

Still does it.

A lot of wasted money chasing this one....

Back from the dead. The other day I had to charge my battery because the car had sat a few weeks and the battery was pretty low. So as usual I forgot about it and left it on a few days. When I did go out and start it up it started like a real champ. It even seems to be running a bit better now. This was a week ago and I havn't driven it since. I need to go see if it held the charge and get the battery tested. My car likes to flood sometimes too so it's a REAL treat trying to get the car to start when it's flooded AND the starter only engages when it wants to. It's OK though it only happens when there are a bunch of people around so I can look like a reas ass. :)

Anyone have any progress reports on this?

what update he had some sort of electrical short in the steering coloum and replaced the starter solenoid without looking at the ignition switch............

I did the same thing rousu did. I figured it was the original starter with ~120k on it. So I bought a low mileage one and it still does it to this day. I suspect it's the clutch switch under the column. But, car always starts on 1st, 2nd or 3rd click so it isn't a big priority to me.

Latest part of the detective story
 

-------------------------
The mechanic finally (on the 6th visit?) was able to reproduce and cure the problem at will, and now thinks it will really be fixed.

The ignition switch had been replaced before (as well as the starter/solenoid and battery), but they only replaced the electrical part of the ignition switch. It turns out the mechanical part of the switch workings in there in the column were at fault and with some movements around in the tolerance slop, it would get out of positon to make a good electrical contact sometimes. (How the car knew to do it on a dark night in the rain next to a hoodlum house, I don't know.)
Turns out that in re-tumblering the new switch for the old key, they buggered the alarm system, so I have to wait one more day to return to summer driving.

The replacement and fix in a shop can run up to 600$ more or less, so you can decide whether that is worth it to avoid de-impressing your friends with a car that acts like it won't start. And the car is not a good necking car for pulling that on a dark back road with your new lady friend....

Bummer.

First start, no problem.

Second start, had to try key 3 times before normal start.

Big bill, no fixie problem.


At least it always starts... eventually. I think the record number of key turns with no response before a normal start is 20 for my car.

Still doing it
 

there is another thread on this problem. Search for click click

My car is still intermittently doing the click click ... click start schtick over two years later.

Several proposed solutions are on the other thread.

cheers