I have an 87 turbo II I recently purchased from a friend. It was essentially a small project car that had to have a few things put back together. As soon as the battery is hooked up(even with the ignition off) one of the starter wires starts smoking? I'm not sure what would cause this or what this could be other than some sort of a wiring issue. The car has had the battery relocated to the passenger storage bin and my friend believes it has a jdm s4 motor in it (I'm still learning all the differences I can post pics if necessary). My friend however got the car running shortly before with no issue that he was aware of until he was working with it one day and this kind of just happened out of the blue. Any ideas or suggestions what to check for or to do?

 

Sounds like the main starter power wire is grounded. Or the starter has failed internally.

 

Thanks Aaron, I'll check it out the next time I get a chance. I was a little sleepy when writing this. I'm pretty sure its the starter that was smoking as there was that burning metal smell similar to burning up a clutch or welding, as opposed to a wire. But same principle.

 

check at the starter.
there are 2 12mm nuts.One is positive,the other (that should NOT be used) grounds the solenoid casing to the starter.
If you use that nut you get a short.

 

Thanks man. Yeah I'll give all that a thorough look probably later in the week. I've got college finals the first part of the week so that has all my attention at the moment. Not having looked at the car yet I just keep wondering what would cause this to happen all of a sudden unless wiring had shifted or the starter just up and went bad, but right now those are really my two main leads and both possible. Let's just hope its something fairly simple.

 

Alright so I yanked the starter out of the car. Upon inspection nothing was touching, however when I got it out the terminal for the main power source on the solenoid was a little wiggly.
I went and got it tested at the local OReilly auto parts and it didn't even turn over on their test machine so I ordered up a new one. This should hopefully fix the problem but I'll provide the final results when I receive the starter on Tuesday and install it. I figured I might as well keep this thread updated for anyone else who might run into a similar problem.

 

And also the starter would not smoke with the ignition off, but with the key turned in the 'on' or 'accessory' position.

 

Forgot about this thread and figured I'd give the final update. I put the new starter on and the problem was solved! It appeared to have been the original starter for the j spec engine in the car so it had seen its better days.