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Technical 1.2 starter not turning

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Technical 1.2 starter not turning

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Avocet

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Hi all, I wonder if I could pick everyone's brains please? Daughter's Punto has just failed to start (8 valve 1.2). She arrived somewhere, parked for about 10 minutes, came back and there's just a buzzing / rattling / clicking noise from the starter area as if the solenoid isn't pulling in. Plenty of juice in the battery, and the battery terminals look to be tight.

The car fired up instantly when we bump-started it, but on the way home she said her speedo was dropping out periodically and as I was following her, I thought her brake lights were flickering a bit.

I'd be grateful for any suggestions, please? When it gets light, I'll check the battery terminals and I know there's one earthing point between the battery negative and the chassis, then another on to the bellhousing. Can anyone think of anything else I could check?
 
Had something similar, just bought a new battery and all good now, my old battery seemed to have plenty of juice too, but just wouldn't start when cold, clicking, buzzing noise as you described, I just bit the bullet and bought a new battery
 
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I would check earth points, follow battery - lead to body and gearbox and clean well, also terminals on battery.
 
Thanks guys. No luck though. Battery load tests OK. Both earth points removed, cleaned and re-assembled. Jump lead attached to battery negative and the engine mounting. Still nothing.

I think that's about all I can do without getting underneath now. I'd happily believe it was the starter, but for her speedometer problems.
 
Avocet said:
Thanks guys. No luck though. Battery load tests OK. Both earth points removed, cleaned and re-assembled. Jump lead attached to battery negative and the engine mounting. Still nothing.

I think that's about all I can do without getting underneath now. I'd happily believe it was the starter, but for her speedometer problems.
Click to expand...

put another good working battery on it.., just as a test.:)

the flickering speedo means it's NOT just a sticky starter..so therefore MUST be electrical;)
EDIT - worth a read..
https://www.fiatforum.com/grande-punto/348311-fiat-will-not-start-key-help.html
 
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I had something like this.

Whenever I started the car it would sometimes screech and not start.

Got a new battery and its fixed my problem
 
Thanks all. I've gone for a new starter now. Only trouble is, I'm struggling to remember how to put the wires back on! Does anyone have any guidance they can offer, please?

I have a thin wire with a very large eyelet terminal on it. That seems to go right over the stud and over a plastic base that the stud pokes out from. As far as I can see, it touches a metal ring on the back of the solenoid and is then "sandwiched" against it by the plastic cover that goes over that stud. It doesn't seem to be held there by a nut or anything?!

Then there's a thick positive wire, straight from the battery, and a thinner wire with a rectangular termonal that has a hole in it to go over the stud and a slight bend in the end.

Anyone have any idea where they all go please, and how they are held? The two thick wires look like they are held on to the stud with nuts. The one with the big eyelet is a complete mystery!
 
OK, I think I've remembered now. It's only one thin wire and one thick (battery) wire to the stud on the back of the starter, the other was an earth wire to the back of the block.

Unfortunately, it has made NO DIFFERENCE!!! I still turn the key and nothing happens. Battery has been disconnected for a few days now and I've noticed the immobiliser light on the dash too. I can't remember whether that was on last time or not.

Any thoughts anyone, please? I've never wanted to torch a car as much as this one!
 
Thanks Andy. I'll nip out and tru that. Something else I was wondering, my daughter has the "remote" key with her at present. I'm using the "spare" key (with no remote). Is it possible that after the battery had been disconnected for a few days, I need to do something like lock and unlock it with the remote key before the car will start? It has started previously with the spare key, but I was just wondering if you had to do anything special after a prolonged battery disconnection.
 
Sorted!! I'd checked the body earth plenty of times, but always concentrated on the cleanliness of the stud on the body and the eyelet on the cable.

In the course of trying to trace this fault, I put a jump lead on to the engine block and on to the battery negative. This had made no difference. Just now (in desperation more than anything else!), I put a SECOND jump lead from the battery negative to the BODY and it fired up!

I then went back to the earth lead, gave it a tug, and the bottom half just pulled straight out of its heat shrink! The end of the copper strands were green anf furry inside the heat shrink - it had obviously been doing that for a long time!

Obviously, without a second jump lead to the body, it made no difference that the connection between the battery and the ENGINE had been restored, because there was no connection between the battery and the BODY (and therefore, no path for the signal from the key to the solenoid).

Thanks all, and I hope this helps someone else out!
 
Avocet said:
Sorted!! I'd checked the body earth plenty of times, but always concentrated on the cleanliness of the stud on the body and the eyelet on the cable.

In the course of trying to trace this fault, I put a jump lead on to the engine block and on to the battery negative. This had made no difference. Just now (in desperation more than anything else!), I put a SECOND jump lead from the battery negative to the BODY and it fired up!

I then went back to the earth lead, gave it a tug, and the bottom half just pulled straight out of its heat shrink! The end of the copper strands were green anf furry inside the heat shrink - it had obviously been doing that for a long time!

Obviously, without a second jump lead to the body, it made no difference that the connection between the battery and the ENGINE had been restored, because there was no connection between the battery and the BODY (and therefore, no path for the signal from the key to the solenoid).

Thanks all, and I hope this helps someone else out!
Click to expand...


https://www.fiatforum.com/grande-punto/318839-electrical-gremlin-thread.html

All mentioned in the FAQ :D ;)
 
It's an excellent FAQ entry, but if I might just suggest one addition, in my case, it wasn't any of the faults listed there. It was the fact that the earth strap had corroded away to nothing and finally snapped INSIDE its heat shrink sleeve, just below where the body earth stud is!

It's similar to ElliotW's problem in this thread with pics:

https://www.fiatforum.com/grande-punto/432857-car-wont-start-pic-included-2.html

except in my case, there was no electrical insulation tape binding it, just the original factory heat shrink, AND in his case, the copper had pulled out of the crimp, whereas in my case, it was still trapped in the crimp but had corroded and fatigued through, immediately below the crimp INSIDE the plastic.
 
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