Starter moter symptoms.
 

So I have two starter motors doing the same thing
A second hand oem unit~ some 15 years old and a Chinese replacement of unknown age- came with xj when bought.
They are both displaying same symptoms.
Both test fine on the bench. i.e. spin and throw forward.

Symptoms:
Turn the key and just get a clunk (as if battery was flat) turn key again and it fires up fine, nice and quick =plenty of juice in the battery.
when i get the clunk the volts drop to like 9.5 something low like that.

its almost as if the starter has not got enough grunt to spin the engine.

the oem starter is 50/50 on weather it will clunk or start.
the chinease copy was 50/50 then mostly not, then not at all.
Again goes fine on the bench.

Can the solenoid contacts degrade to the point where it will spin on the bench but not pass enough current to spin the engine?
I've had toyota solenoids appart before but these mitisi units look to be a sealed unit

Any input appreciated.

Sounding like it's the starter drive. I have had two S/H SM's where the starter drive has failed. The clunk you described is the noise a starter drive make when it is failing. That is too why it works on the bench. I am in the process of rebuilding two SMs with new drives.



Regards A

Without hearing it
I would say its a short negative brush
pretty common in mitsubishi starters

but what the hell would I know

Funny you say that. I bought a brand new mitsi branded starter from repco for the ex-wifes L300. Lasted 3 days then shit itself. Went back to repco and bought a bosch and it's still going. The mitsi brushes burnt out.

Sent from my HTC Explorer A310e using Tapatalk 2

Could this be of any help ?

http://www.ausjeepoffroad.com/forum/...d.php?t=133099

the mitsi has a new brush plate with brushes.
the Chinese has plenty meat on the brushes.
both been pulled apart cleaned and lightly greased.

Last time the bendix gear failed on one of my vehicles (non jeep) it made a clicking ratchiting sound. I'm just getting a solid thunk.

at this point I'm thinking that either the solenoid contacts
or maybe one of the windings in the armature had burnt out so the motor is not operating at 100% when the burnt winding is lined up with a brush.

[QUOTE=rainman;1470144]
Last time the bendix gear failed on one of my vehicles (non jeep) it made a clicking ratchiting sound. I'm just getting a solid thunk.
QUOTE]

Mine did the thunk and is doing it again. Bendix fixed it before and will most likely fix it again.

Regards A