Starting trouble - Must be starter circuit?

Hi everyone,

When i bought my diesel 2.25 lightweight (1980) land rover, the coil above the starter solenoid was burnt out and the solenoid had been botched to work on the button inside of the cab, and it did work until the solenoid finally gave up.

So, I bought a new coil and a new starter solenoid (Land Rover 2.3 88 109 3.5 Starter Solenoid Bendix 77> on eBay, also, Land Rover, Classic Car Parts, Cars, Parts Vehicles (end time 16-Dec-08 19:22:30 GMT) ).

I installed them both and with a full battery pushed the glow plug button in.

The new coil within 10 seconds went from cold to glowing red, the voltage then slowly crept up from 6 volts and stops at 12.3v. This also the same on the glow plugs.

After about 30 seconds of holding the button I try to start the engine and it tries to start but doesn't quite do it.

Two possibilities i'm thinking of, the starter solenoid that I bought, although gives 12 volts to the glow plugs. Isn't enough to accommodate the power going to the starter motor and is the wrong one. The other is the battery or starter motor are U/S.

Does anyone know any thing about this or even knows what kind of starter should be in my land rover, as the solenoid is for a Bendix. Can anyone check to see if i've bought the right solenoid?

Many thanks in advance
John

i'd say you've got it wired up wrongly

The diesel engines should have the starter solonoid on the starter motor because they are the pre-engagement type. I'm wandering if you've got a starter motor for a petrol engine bolted on there. There should be a live wire going to the glow plug switch and from there it should go to the glow plug coil thingy and from there to each of the glow plugs in turn. There's a wiring diargram on Page 4 of this link:

http://www.stage1v8.net/manuals/SIII_ROM_Part_7.pdf

on the solenoid there are 2 pins, the front has about 5 thick wires connected to it, which are always live.

the rear one just has a red wire that then goes to the coil above it, it then goes through the coil, glows red and to a very thick wire which goes to the glow plugs.

If i look down into the passenger side of the engine while a friend tries to start the landy, I can see something like a connection glowing red everytime the engine tries to turn, so I think maybe the solenoid on the starter is U/S also?

Thanks for the .pdf, very good guide.

Anyone else have any info?

nothing exposed should be glowing! thats potential for a fire.
by the sounds of it you need either a good wiring diagram and do the whole lot again or someone who knows landy wiring.
I'd offer to help if i was local.
something is definately not right there.

where are you johny ?

Tig is right you have got a real fire hazard there - it sounds like you've got the high current circuit wired through the coil - the coil just requires 12v across it (via the ignition switch) this then pulls the main contacts together which then provides the high current supply to the starter etc

can you post an image of what's connected to the soleniod

Sure thing, ill take lots of photos and some videos hopefully.

will just be a moment

Ok, here's some photos:


By johnyelland1234





The item on the last photo, which the white arrow points to, is that the starter solenoid for the starter motor? Or the entire starter motor?

Also the data plate says the land rover is a 24 volt version. Although there is only 1 battery, I thought you had to have 2 batteries to make it 24v. Also i've never seen anything is the circuit that creates or uses 24v.

I'm located at RAF Marham in Norfolk.

Many thanks again,
John

PS Video to follow of me trying to start it, when i can get imageshack.us to work ;p

thats different

have you gorra multimeter johnny ?

is that like an electrical rubber johnny?



coz "resistance is fertile" (startrek joke)

The Mad Hat Man said:

is that like an electrical rubber johnny?

Click to expand...

oh act yer age fer wunce

I have

if it was me i'd have the starter/solenid out - check that works - then disconnect all wiring that's associted with the GPs untill you have the starter circuit working - then put the wiring back to how it should be wired, as per the circuit diagram

it'll take you as long to put it back to how it should be wired as it would take to figure out the bodge

that is a pre-engaged type starter and is correct for the diesel engine.
what is the solenoid on the bulkhead for? you dont need it for the starter as its got one already.
the glow plugs i'm sure dont need one either as they use the coil arrangement in the photo. maybe wrong.
just going from when me and a mate rebuilt a series 3 diesel so its all from memory!

Is it the thing the last arrow points to in the last picture?

Would you suggest testing by simply hooking it up to battery with thick wire after taking it out?

If it has one battery, does this mean it has to be a 12v? or could it be 24v even with 1 battery?

yes that is the starter solenoid attatched to the bigger starter itself.
to test it leave it on, get a good battery and put a live to the main terminal, then another live to the starter wire which is the smaller one with a spade connector on it.
i would have thought that one battery means it is 12v but put a multimeter set to dc across it.

i think it would be safer to remove the starter before you start appling a high current 12v source to it

make sure you put it in a vice or something as i did that once with something whizzy and it shot halfway across the workshop! well it worked i suppose!

lol, will do, i'll try that tomorrow.

Any idea why the coil glows bright red? or the solenoid smokes when trying to start?