Thread: Starting issues, Need Help

So I have a pretty unique situation that has left me dumbfounded. Yesterday my wife's car (05 GP) wouldn't start. When you turn the key to the ignition all power works, radio, gauges, etc. When I try to turn the car over I can hear the hum from the fuel pump and a click in the dash near the glove compartment. Here's where things start to get sketchy and blow my mind.

I hooked up jumper cables to a vehicle I know has a good battery- still no crank. I even took the battery in to get bench tested and it scored 740 out of 800. This tells me that the problem is not with the battery

I took the starter out and had it bench tested at the parts store. It was put through multiple rounds and passed each test with no problem. Jus to be sure I bought a new started that I brought home and hooked up hoping that would be the problem.....turns out it wasn't.

I have switched relays with similar ones and have checked all of the fuses. All seem to be fine. I took a volt meter to see if there was power to the starter and I get 12v's so I don't see that there should be a problem. The damn thing just wont turn over. The guy at the parts store thinks that the only other thing it could be is the ignition switch. Which he claims there's no way to test and the part would cost $160 and take 3 days to get to the store.

A little history: A couple days ago my wife said that it took her 3 tries to get the car to start, but she claims that the motor would turn over, now there is nothing. I'm quite positive that the motor isn't seized, and the starter wouldn't turn over even while disconnected from the transmission. (all terminals hooked up, just not bolted to the car) I tried to ground the starter by hooking the starter to the frame with jumper cables and still nothing.

I worked on it all morning and this has confused the heck out of my and a few gearhead friends. Please somebody let me know what other options I can take, I don't have the money to take in to a shop or to throw at unnecessary parts. Please help me to diagnose the situation and what I can do to get it fixed. Thanks a lot.

Neutrals safety switch?

Step 1) Try manually turning the engine. If it spins move to step 2.
Step 2) Hard wire an in-line switch to the starter.
Step 3) Switch Key to "on"
Step 4) flip in-line switch.

Does it start? If yes, either the chip key is no longer sync'd or the reader went bad.

Go through a security relearn, attempt to start with the key. If it works, you're done. If not, ignition has likely gone bad. You can either pay the 160 and change ignition or pay someone to change it.... or, just relocate the in-line switch to a location in the car you feel comfortable with.

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I believe i tried to start the car in neutral with no luck. All advice listed above gives me some direction in how to solve the problem, so thank you all for that. The ignition switch seems to be the worst case scenario, minus the siezed motor. The only thing that makes me feel its not the ignition switch was that just prior to a total no turn, no start, the motor turned but took 3 attempts to run. Then, next time just clicked with no

So I tried to dig in a little deeper into the starting issue today utilizing a lot of your advice. I tried to bypass the solenoid by bridging the two starter terminals together. It didn't start, just threw a bunch of sparks( when installing the starter I over tightened the bottom terminal cracking the insulation case it sits in.) This means that I have power running to the starter. I also took a volt gauge and tested the smaller terminal, I believe it's called the "S" terminal. I was not getting any power or voltage to that even when turning over the key.

From what I understand this would mean that there is something bad in the ignition or tumbler. I followed the purple wire from the S terminal to the harness case. This led up towards the firewall on the drivers side. I then noticed that there was a green wire that had become split at one of the connectors, I took a picture and hope the upload works. Can any of you tell me what this connector is for, and if possible what the green wire is? This could be the sole root of the problem. I had to work so couldn't further tinker but this has been driving me crazy for days.

*I cant get the picture to upload: the clip is a grey clip located on drivers side near where the shocks mount in wheel well. The clip has an arrow that points towards the firewall. There are approximately 8 wires all of various colors. One of which appears to be the same purple as the S terminal on starter. The diameter of this wire though is about half as thick as the starters. I will keep trying to get the picture to work but I hope this info can at least help somebody fill me in.

Here it is. I finally got it to work

*update* so i opened the connector and pulled the pins (male and female) to the green wire. Couldnt find anywhere that sold just the pins so i clipped off the male end and stripped the wire. Once the wire was bipassed from the connector i placed wire in female pin and crimped it. I then wrapped some wire across male and female side and taped it up. Turned the key and she started.

I cracked the bottom starter terminal from over tightening so i will use some auto-electrical caulk to re-seal the starter but other then that all is well. Cost me a bit of time, a 12 pack of beer, $4 tape, and whatever the caulk costs.

Lesson learned: dont overlook the simple things. Idk how the wire got cut but it turned out to be a simple fix. All the info provided in this post helped me to diagnose the problem, so thank you to all that helped. It is much appreciated!