When the car was towed in was it rolling okay I assume in N ?

Starter may be STUCK and frozen in the "engaged" stage. Try putting the car in D and rock it.

 

^^^ I second that thought.

 

Thanks Dean. It was rolling fine into garage from roll back tow truck.
I will try to rock it around a bit when I get home tonight.
Good to hear from you.

 

So the brown milky discharge just appeared and isn't coming from rad?? This is getting mysteriouser, sic. I suspect there may be more going on here than we (or you) know. What Dean said, then Wally's fav homemade penetrating oil is 50/50 ATF and acetone, applied to starter bolts, then a couple loving whacks with hammer, then ez out if you can get one positioned.

 

does it have a factory alarm system?

 

Wouldn't jumping the starter at the 14 pin post bypass the alarm system?

 

Remove all the spark plugs, and then try to turn the engine over manually, if it does turn over then check to see if any liquid comes out of the plugs, can be hydrolocked for some reason (old gasket leaking oil/water into cylinders or one of the injectors are jammed open and with fuel pumping it pushed in too much fuel)

With the spark plugs removed you wont have to worry about going against compression. If it still doesnt turn over then something else is jamming the engine. Check the flexplate and flywheel if something is stuck there.


==================================================
19?? VW Baja Bug (Completely custom, Golf 1.8 motor, and many, many mods) - Currently my daily drive
1988 Porsche 928 S4 Euro/ROW (Black with Ivory interior) - Under ECU surgery
1982 Porsche 924 Euro (Silver with cream interior)- Gone
1982 Porsche 928 S (Manual) Euro (Petrol Blue with Blue with black and white chequered interior) - Gone
1983 Porsche 928 S (Auto, NA spec, Red, black interior) - Gone
1994 BMW 530i Manual (Maroon, grey interior) - Gone

 

Brian--

The noises you describe are typical of a starter motor trying to turn a locked-up crank.

For others, the solenoid on the starter does two things. First, it slides the starter pinion to engage the ring gear. Once the pinion is forward, the end of the plunger in the solenoid engages/connects two heavy copper lugs. One is the battery feed, the other the primary wire to the starter motor. A solenoid stuck fully in the engaged position also engages the starter motor. The drive on the pinion includes a set of one-way rollers, so the engine can't overspeed the starter after it starts. With that in mind, even a fully engaed pinion will not prevent the engine from being rotated by hand in the normal direction.


---

After the plugs are out, and if you still can't rotate the crank from the front, consider dropping the inspection cover under the flywheel and shaft coupler. You can sometimes use a large screwdriver or a heavy-duty pry bar to roll the engine via teeth on the ring gear. If you can't move it there, it's -really- locked up. Pull some oil out at the drain plug, and/or carefully cut open the filter to see if there's metal in the oil, a telltale of mechanical failures.


There are a coulple different sources for internal bolt extractors for the starter bolts. I don't have search handy, but others have shared some links to them. I think even Sears carries a set. They screw/wedge into the head of the Allen bolts, left-handed turning draws them in tighter as you extract the bolts.

 

So many good tips and ideas. Thanks to everyone.

I have started a word document to sort out the things I have tried from the ideas not yet tried. I have two hours tonight to work on it and then will be away from the car until next week.

Thanks again for all of your help.

 

On the bright side, you have lots of sparkly stars.

 

Well with the help of Wally's special sauce, I was able to remove the starter. I left the wires connected, hooked the ground strap back up and tried to crank.?.?.?
I may be way off base but I expected the starter to turn if it were functional. Is that correct? The starter made no sound at all. I guess I should have jumper the two wires again to see if the starter is the problem...... I had another one in house so I swapped them out. After wiring it up I tried the same test and got the same result. The starter that I used was from a parts car with just over 100,000 miles on it.

Should one or either of the starters, when wired up properly, spin if they are not mounted properly? I have a armature works just down the street from my office so I could drop them before I leave town tomorrow and have them both rebuilt.

 

You could take it down to a local Autozone and they can put it in their tester machine and see if it spins. I'm sure just about any parts store could if you don't have an Autozone.

 

I used jumper cables to the battery when I disassembled mine and cleaned it......should spin....

 

Thanks guys. I just wanted to make sure I was thinking clearly about it.

 

if your going to be testing the starter you should have two people,
first get your helper or use a vice,
secure the starter,

then use two battery cables.

NOTE the connections
the negative is hooked to the cast housing...

the positive is hooked to the stud the wires are connected to.


then you would get a screwdriver and touch the 50 lead,

this is where the small wire attaches the starter should jump.