Starter and Ignition Troubleshooting

[axxense]

I just had a problem with turning the key and getting nothing - no crank, no click, nothing. As I read through the posts, I found a lot of info scattered around. I pieced a lot of it together, but, had to do my own post and go through it to nail it down.

I discovered the following (with the help of others) and decided to post it here so the next person wouldn't have to read through a bunch of stuff.

By the way, this was done on an '05 H2, yet, should be rather H2 universal, I suppose.

If you want to troubleshoot a no cranking problem and figure out if it is the starter or the ignition, do the following...

Access the starter by looking over the passenger side front wheel through the wheel well. If you can turn the wheels all the way to the left, you might have better access. You will see three terminals on your starter. One smaller terminal and two larger ones. The smaller terminal is the ignition (start), the bottom-most large terminal is the battery (hot or power). The other large terminal has a cable that goes back into the starter cylinder body.

Using a voltmeter, clip the red (+) voltmeter lead on to the smaller start (ignition) terminal on your starter. Then clip the black (-) voltmeter lead on to the starter housing (ground). Place the voltmeter on the hood of the truck - so you can see it from the drivers seat - you will need a voltmeter with leads about 3 or more feet long. Turn the key all the way to start - if the voltmeter reads voltage (12ish volts), your ignition is likely fine and the problem lay with your starter. If the voltmeter reads little to nothing, you may have a problem with your ignition circuit. From what I have read in the posts, it is likely the ignition switch.

There ya have it.

A couple of other things/procedures...

If you have a smaller hand-held voltmeter - do the connections as above and have someone else turn the key for you as you watch the voltmeter.

1. You can jump the bottom-most large terminal (hot) to the smaller terminal (start or ignition) - if the starter is fine, it should crank. I did this with a long, thin-handled crescent wrench. Yes, I wore an insulated glove, just in case. I also wrapped the its handle with electrical tape as to protect from bumping something. You can also use a screwdriver or something like it. If the starter cranks, you may have an ignition circuit (switch) problem.

2. You can touch the red (+) lead from a test light (those typical electricians test lights) to the smaller terminal (the start or ignition terminal) and the black (-) lead to ground and have someone turn the key all the way to start - if it lights, your ignition circuit is likely fine and the problem is likely with your starter. If it doesn't light, the problem likely lay within your ignition circuit (switch is most likely) and your starter is likely fine.

3. You can pop the top off of the engine compartment fuse box - locate the starter relay. Remove it. Jump connections 30 and 87 (the diagram on the underside of the fuse box cover will tell you which relay is for the starter and which connections are 30 and 87) - this removes the ignition switch from the circuit - if the starter cranks, you may have an ignition problem. If the starter doesn't crank, it is likely a starter problem.

Thanks again to Elcova Forums and all who helped me. I hope this will help others.