starter failure mode theory

["Paul Irvine" <pi@domain.elided>]

'79 SPICA 2 liter

I've had this problem with the Alfetta for the past few months. On warm
days, after driving the car for 30 or 40 minutes, if you shut it off the
starter would not crank. I've lived with it because I usually just drive to
work and back and it always starts okay after it has sat for several hours
and cooled down and I've had lots of other things to do and I'm basically
the quintessential lazy slob so I wasn't going to pull the starter unless I
really had too.

Well the other day I was on my way to work and the thing wouldn't crank over
even though it was stone cold. I wanted to do some poking around before
pulling the starter off so I disconnected the cold start solenoid and the
starter worked. Of course the engine wouldn't start though so I plugged the
cold start solenoid back in and it started fine. It was then that I noticed
the layer of crud (oil and dirt) that was covering the area where the
solenoid connection is. This isn't unusual, sometimes when I remove the air
cleaner I forget to reconnect the hose from the oil separator and it dumps
right onto the top of the SPICA pump where the cold start solenoid resides.
Add a little road dirt to hold it all together and I think, at least this is
my theory, you create a conductive path from the cold start connection to
the body of the solenoid which is essentially chassis ground. At least
enough to prevent the starter solenoid from engaging.

I cleaned up the crud on the cold start and reconnected the oil separator
hose and so far it's been working fine. Even after extended drives the
starter still cranks over okay. If it continues to work okay for the next
few weeks I think I will be convinced that my theory is correct. For now I'm
still a bit skeptical though.

Anyone else have an opinion on this?

Paul Irvine  - Antioch CA
72 Spider - 79 Sprint Veloce - 82 GTV6
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Project Alfa - http://www.crl.com/~pi/project
E-Mail - mailto:pi@domain.elided

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