So I just replaced my starter with a brand new NAPA auto premium starter. I replaced it because I was getting really weak starts from my old starter. It seemed like bad batteries but after checking them they were fine. Anyway I threw in a new starter and it worked great for a few days. Now on some starts I get a click and after trying to start it 3 or 4 times with it clicking it will engage and fire up strong. I'm not sure whats up because it seems to be a bad solenoid but its brand new. Ideas?

 

how old are your batteries? a tester might say they are ok but at how many amps for how long? a car tester at advance auto could say your batteries are fine, but thats for starting a car and youre starting an engine with almost twice the compression and twice the displacement of some cars. did you disconnect the wires that connect the two batteries in parallel to give you twice the amperage of just one battery when you tested them? ive convinced myself more than a few times that a bad battery was not the issue when it was and would have saved me alot of time and money had i just replaced them, just hope my expierence might help your situation. ive even expierenced a guy that started his car, drove to a place i worked in high school, picked up food, got back in his car to have a dead battery not even enough juice to engage his starter. hooked it up to my 2 battery truck after trying a 1 battery explorer for a while and poof, it works!

 

it could be a bad connection between the terminals and the cables

 

I don't have any idea if it's your problem but ran into this recently
http://startercontacts.com/relay.htm

 

I think Bill is on the right track. I'm going to look into the relay. The batteries were load tested and seem ok and once the solenoid engaged is starts nice and stong.

 

Thanks for the ideas, I too am having a similar problem: no crank, no click, lights do not dim, then after three or four tries it fires and runs a-ok.