After a day playing in the mud yesterday, I went outside this morning to go and rewind my winch cable and give it a good hose out. Unfortunately when I turned the key there was absolutely nothing
The heater fan was running fine, so the battery is ok.
A quick look at the wonderful Haynes manual and I found that it is on the passenger side of the engine pointing towards the flywheel. The haynes manual suggests cleaning all the cables, which I just couldn't get to so missed that step and went to try the solenoid cabling, attaching a multimeter from the spade connector onto the solenoid to earth proved that there was power when the key was turned to the start position.
I found then that it was easiest just to remove the starter motor entirely to go any further, it is just held in with 3 nuts/bolts.
On removal I then took the solenoid off, it is held on with three screws, and tested it directly on the battery, the spade terminal to positive and there is a metal ring around the bottom face which is the negative, absolutely nothing.
Looking at new starters, they are not far off ?100 so lets try and find a solenoid. The only place I could find was
http://www.repairkitsuk.com/1.htmlCarl was one of the most helpful people I have come across, instead of just selling me the solenoid straight away he talked me through some more checks which only took a few minutes and were:
With the starter out, use jump leads and connect the casing to earth (gearbox) and the small cable coming out of the motor itself to battery positive, that worked perfectly.
Inspect the commutator and brushes for wear (mine is a Bosch). First remove the small cap on the end which is held on by two posidrive screws. Under this is a C clip, remove this. Then remove the two 8mm nuts that hold the end of the starter on (not the gear end) and gently pull the end cap off to reveal the end of the armature. You can now see all the brushes and the commutator, I still over half the brushes left and the comm was not worn.
After reassembly, I did recheck it still worked and ordered the new solenoid, ?35 delivered, far better than the ?100 or so for a new unit and I know the history of the motor itself.
I'll do some photos when I reassemble for clarity, but a very simple and straightforward job and many thanks to Carl, its good to see decent customer service rather than just there to make a quid or two.
