zekgb

Bill Ball came down today and we got the engine dropped in which went relatively drama free. However before doing the timing with the 32ver we used the starter to bump the engine and settle the belt. Bill noticed that the starter was quite noisy and on inspection the bendix gear is not disengaging from the flywheel. We tried removing and reinstalling the starter as well as slightly loosening the mounting bolts with no difference. The engine has just been dropped in and spark plugs are not installed, could no compression be making a difference? The starter bracket was never touched while the engine was on the stand. Anything else we can check?

Mrmerlin

take the starter apart and clean the bendix and solenoid,
add a small amount of grease to the shaft and put it back together

GlenL

It's the starter

Bill Ball

Off the car, the starter turns and sounds fine and the Bendix works well. Bolted to the motor, it makes a loud racket when engaging the flywheel and does not retract when done. It appears to be too tight to the flywheel. It does turn the motor over well, just with a racket and no retraction. I've never encountered this. Anyway, Kevin, go ahead and take Stan's advice. If that doesn't fix it, then I guess Glen is indicating the Bendix drive is kaput.

zekgb

I'll add that rotating the engine via the crank bolt just a half turn causes the bendix gear to disengage the flywheel though it doesn't completely retract until nudged a bit.

Dave928S

Are the teeth on the flywheel OK? Worn teeth can cause the bendix gear to jam and give noisy engagement. Also +1 on Stans advice ... dry/worn bendix can inhibit engagement and cause jamming.

GlenL

I had this happen and only a new starter would fix it. I'm _guessing_ it's wear on a bushing that lets the shaft move sideways and bind up.

It's be nice if the starter could have shims added to adjust the gear engagement as on some engines. But the Germans, expecting everything to be done right, don't allow for that. Holes versus slots!

zekgb

Are people going with the IMI unit these days vs. rebuilt Bosch?

GlenL

IMI?

A rebuilt Bosch would be fine.

SeanR

This.

zekgb

OK I got the rebuilt starter installed and when I went to test it..... same behavior as before including the high pitched sound Bill and I heard previously. I decided to drop in the spark plugs and voila, pinion gear disengages perfectly and the sound was normal. As per the speculation in my OP I'm guessing that with no compression to work, against the ring gear was freewheeling against the stopped pinion gear and providing enough tension so that it couldn't retract. So it turns out I probably didn't need the rebuilt unit but it's cheap enough that at this point it's a rounding error in this project.