well after playing some more with the car ...i still accomplished absolutely nothing ...and everything on the starter is completing a circuit ...my dad thinks the ignition switch is bad or its a cable coming off of the starter ...but everything else powers up but he engine wont turn over and the starter doesnt kick in :( sigh

does anyone live in like south jersey ....im 15 mins outside of philly in south jersey :( and i really dont want to fork out about 300-400 bucks for an auto shop to take a look at it ...if someone would be willing to help me out ahh!!

Did you have the starter tested and it's okay?

I forget, did you jump the positive lead and the S terminal, and did that get the starter to kick?

If you haven't had it tested, I would pull it out and get it tested before you continue to beat your head against the wall.

I may be over that way later this week to pick up my 8.5 somewhere near AtCo. Do you know how many teeth your flexplate is, or can you tell me if your starter bolts are even or staggered? I have a couple good starters laying around, so I may have another you can try.

not to sure how many teeth it is ...since i bought the car from a guy ...its the stock tranny that comes with a stock 305 ...thats all me knows i havent had the chance to study it ... and i didnt have them test the starter and im thinkin that could be the problem and the thing is i have to drop my exhaust system to pull the new one out and i cant drop it cause i have a stubborn nut on one of the manifolds that will not come off and is completely stripped :( and so pretty much if it comes to me having to pull the starter ...its going to the shop cause i dont have the tools to get that off...and we tested everything and tried to jump the starter ...didnt get anything

the starter is grounded properly that was tested ...like my dad says i think might be the issue because when you turn the key ...one of the cables should be a toggle for the starter ...the only thing is that they are all on when the ignition is switched off ...which confuses me and its driving me nuts and my head has been smashed against the wall alot lately cause of it :(

and the thing is 3 weeks ago i bought it and it was running fine ...the starter when you were starting it took a second or two to turn over and my dad goes starters going bad lets pull it out ...and now ...IT WONT START AHHH ...all the switches on the shifter are setup properly and im running out of things to check ...its something with the cable setup thats all i have to say and im prolly a complete idiot and doing it wrong and my dad doesnt have much time to help me out since its always dark when he comes home and this is just becoming super frustrating ...at least i have another car to drive ...its just depressing knowing i have a semi nice 86 iroc z camaro sitting in my driveway!!!

On a 1986, the starter bolts would be even. Can you test with a volt meter to make sure you are getting power to the starter? If you are getting power at those wires on the starter, then you can bet it is the starter at fault, and not the wiring. Perhaps this is what you mean by "everything on the starter is completing a circuit"?

my dad thinks that one of the cables should be in off and when you attempt to start the car it powers up the starter ...i think false to that idea

and im thinkin the starter is a POS! hehe stupid refurb... growl* if we would have just left the original starter in and let me let someone else replace it i wouldnt be in this hole right now ...and like i said i cant pull it out to test it all the way because ...i dont have anything to remove that stupid nut !

umm everything is completing a circuit ...like everything thats connecting to the starter all the cables complete a circuit so it probably is the starter

Your Dad is right. If you go back and re-read everything we've been telling you, the wire that attaches to the S terminal is from the ignition, so the circuit is not energized until the key is turned all the way to the start position. When the key is turned to start, the circuit energizes, and the solenoid triggers the little gear to back and engage the teeth on the flexplate/flywheel, and the engine turns over. If the S wire was hot all the time the solenoid would stay engaged, and man is that an ugly sound, especially if the engine fires).

If you jump the battery terminal (big wire) to the S terminal, you are shorting the circuit and energizing the solenoid directly, so it should engage. If you jump it and it doesn't crank, either the battery is bad or the solenoid is bad. You can replace just the solenoid, but since you just bought the starter, you would want to return the whole deal.

You can buy a trigger style remote starter for less than $20, and have a safer more consistent way to bypass the ignition switch.

if its not cold out tonight ...im going to attempt to jump start it one more time ...prolly will crash and burn ... but its worth attempting that instead of wasting more money and taking it to barones

welp! good news everyone ...my whole eletrical system needs to be replaced now ...WOOO because well um lets just say i had like 40 "Pop" sounds inside and a little bit of smoke here and there ....this is what you get when you buy a car from some idiot for 1800 bucks that has **** ghetto wired if you wanan call it that


i wonder how much its gonna cost for the entire eletrical system to be replaced :(

ok well ive given up hope and im going to take it to my auto shop ...its 60 bucks to tow it there and 30 for them to take a look and tell me exactly whats wrong with it and it could take up to 300 bucks to fix everything wrong with it

sounds like their going to take a look into a new eletrical system and a better starter and new manifold bolts for it

what do you think the prices for everything should be ?

Well, I can't figure out what happened. I hope that your wires didn't become light bulb filaments and melt all to hell, that would be a nightmare! The only way to really know is to have someone who is familiar with the wiring take a look at it. I just can't imagine what could have gone wrong, a starter swap is usually so simple and straightforward...

not when you buy a car from a kid thats 21 and thinks he knows everything about them and he works on volkswagons for a dealership lol

:( im probably going to have to replace my entire eletrical system now from the looks of it sigh lets pray that i don't and its just something little and stupid