jkelley

Having a weird problem.

I drove home this afternoon, parked the car. Rinsed off the car with the garden hose and wiped it down while my wife got ready for dinner.
30 minutes later we're ready to go, and try starting it... no go. I've never had an issue starting this car.

What happens: Looks like the power draw is HARD, causing the lights to dim down and flicker a couple time (while push button is depressed). There's also a lots of fast click-click-click noise. See my video I just uploaded.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwdTRBOLfT4&feature=youtu.be[/media]


What I have already tried:
Thinking it was the battery, I tried jumping it with our portable jump starter thingy. Same thing. Thinking the unit may be bad or something (I just bought it a couple days ago believe it or not) I tried jumping it with my wife's car. Still the same thing. Another weird thing is that the clock has yet to reset during these attempts. I also tested the battery voltage with a multimeter, it reads a solid 12.0 V. I then tried turning on the headlights (not part of the video above) and they were flickering ON and OFF super fast like a strobe light so I quickly turned them off and took the key out.

Also notice that later in the video the check engine light blinks 5 times then goes away. what's up with that?

Background info:
- Battery terminals are very clean, cleaned them about 4-5 months ago
- Replaced alternator about 4 months ago
- My starter has been screeching about 1 out of ever 3 starts since the weather got colder in October but has never had an issue starting up, I've been told it's really not a big deal?


Can anyone help me? I tried googling this answer but couldn't come to any conclusions.

Utah S2K

Not sure where you are located and cold is a relative term......I'm in Utah....it's cold. That said the starter and belt can scratch when it is cold. But you say you rinsed the car? Just how cold is it....I would have ice in my driveway. That said your symptoms sound like something got wet. Give it some time to dry out.....may take some time if it's cold.

Utah

s2000maniac

See if you can turn the motor by hand. Put a 19mm socket on the crank pulley and try to turn it clock-wise.

emdzey01

Sometimes, the car battery will be so flat that a jump starter wouldn't be able to crank it either. Not even jumper cables to another working battery. The old battery needs to be replaced. I've encountered this problem in a few cars (my old 99 civic, a friend's mid-2000's toyota matrix come to mind).

Change out your battery. If it's more than 3 years old, it's probably time for it anyway.

If you feel like doing it, you can test this by removing the battery out of your wife's car and connecting it to your S (if it's nearly the same size).

By the sound of things, the starter's not getting enough juice to crank the flywheel.

again, CHANGE YOUR BATTERY. nothing else is wrong. your starter sticking issue doesn't have anything to do with it.

report back once it's fixed

jkelley

Ok yea I think I will try changing the battery first. I have never had to jump this car before so I thought that it probably wasn't the battery since I can't even jump it now. Recently, the past 2 months or so, when trying to start the car it did kind of feel like the battery wasn't fully charged and took "a little more effort" than normal to start than what I'm used to.

So I'll start there and report back.

Oh btw when I said I replaced my alternator it was because the rectifier in my OEM was bad (was getting the lightly fluttering dash lights at idle rpm) so I swapped in a low milage OEM one. So It wasn't a new one or a re-core.

jkelley

Ok so I'm confused on the prices of batteries for this car. From what I've been searching in these forums I shouldn't be paying more than ~$70 for a battery but these are the prices I'm seeing from battery companies in the area:

Honda:
$110 OEM battery (the one that most people prefer it seems, so I would prefer this one too)

Autozone:
$126 + $5 core Duralast Gold
$190 + $15 Optima (I think 'yellow top')

Advance Auto Parts:
$128 + $18 AutoCraft Silver
$192 Optima Yellow Top Dual-Purpose (?)

Firestone:
$99 Interstate Mega-Tron II



Am I missing something?

emdzey01

Costco, if you have access to it. 70$, great warranty (36 months free replacement).

jkelley

Well I don't have a Costco or Sam's membership so I had to go with an OEM Honda.

Problem is fixed now it's so weird how it's always fired up and never died on me but then couldn't even jump it once. Just went kersplat on me.

emdzey01

Congrats! You can rest easy now.. Im sure you were thinking that u had something worse going on (like a bad starter or the alternator you replaced was also bad).

Enjoy!