Hi -

my Punto Mk 2 will not start today. I noticed yesterday that it was a bit sluggish to turn over, but started fine....now all I get is the ignition attempting to fire then slowly dying off to nothing. No 'clicking' noise or anything like that. What do you guys think? Battery?
Am going to jump it and see if I can at least get it going somehow.

Thanks!!!

So it turns over but then dies and stops


This is sounding like
A - dead battery / flat battery
B - dying starter motor
C - a poor earth

My advice
Remove battery clean posts and give a good charge
Clean the battery clamps and the main 2 earthing points
If you want to go 1 further, remove the wire to start from battery and clean that really well
That wire then runs to the alternator via a 2nd wire and give them also a good clean


The clean should be done anyway
The battery charge will hide a flat weak battery clause for a few starts only

Ziggy

I've been having this issue recently, where the battery over days starts to sound sluggish and hesistant, then as it gets worse it eventually dies

I found that jumping it did not work and only a full charge does start it (4-6 hour charge)

I've tested the battery yesterday (when fully charged) and it was at 12.56v and 14.01v when started - this seems normal to me but more testing is needed I think.

I'd be interested to see if a solution for your problem could be found

Thanks so much for the replies. I love this forum! Sadly, I have very limited mechanical knowledge to impart back and I always feel like I'm spungeing from your collective wisdom! Anyway, jumped the car fine, sprayed some WD into the plugs (or whatever they are), said a little car prayer and I guess I'll wait till the morning to see if holds the charge.

dont know how old your battery is but for its what its worth, when you manage to get it started drive to a local trusty garage and ask them to test the battery, to see if its a bad battery or good battery (dont know if you've done this alreayd) usually when a battery loses its charge so many times it will always be a weak battery unfortunately, i had this issue a few months ago, jump started it and if i left the car for what two days or overnight guaranteed itd be flat as a pancake next morning! so itd be another jump start, and i had to keep doing this for a whole week until payday and when payday came my old battery just gave in but if you hear no clicking then starter is fine, if you just hear starter trying to start the engine thats normal but there isnt enough juice there to spin the engine as the starter is a greedy item on the car! so do get your battery checked out when you can

Update: sadly, it was as flat as a pancake this morning. Managed to get it jumped (eventually!) and drove it to nearest garage. they changed the battery and.....nothing! Still wouldn't start.
They said it was most likely the starter motor had gone and, as I couldn't drive it away, I figured I'd go with that.
Total bill = £150 plus 60 quid for the battery.

Hope it works tomorrow!

Thanks again.