Dead batteries, with bad cells can't be jumped sometimes. Sometimes they can blow up, or damage the "jumping" vehicles electronics.

Put a tester (or volt meter) on the battery and see if you have any juice in it. Fully charged battery is 12.5 - 12.7v or so, Load test it if you can.

No clicky, no nothing ? bad connections at battery, or at starter, or bad grounds, or bad ignition switch.

Easy to jump the starter solenoid as well.


Start at the battery, make sure it's good, and work your way from there. I heard there was a good "starter" rebuild thread on here somewhere, but I can't remember just where I saw it..

 

How long has it been plugged in? If it's been that cold you will need probably at least 4 hours to warm things up in my experience. My guess is the battery is total dead either due to parasitic drain and/or the cold has zapped it down. I would remove the battery and bring it inside somewhere warm and charge it up.

 

Also BTW your truck being an 2001 it would be the 2nd Gen forum you'd really want, not us lowly and exceeding helpful 1st Gen'ers.

 

Why would you leave a truck plugged in for weeks???

Plugged in on a battery charger or the block hater?

 

 

 

 

I can see no real benefits from plugging in a truck longer than 4 or 5 hours except for the electric company who loves all the electricity you are using.
Maybe a benefit is the snow melts off your hood from the 1000 watt heater.

If it is really cold here, say 0F or below, I might plug my trucks block heater in for an hour or two before I fire it up in the morning.

 

 

If you have good and charged batteries the truck should turn over easily at -25C (-13F) engine temperature.
Mine does start easily under these conditions with only a single optima red battery.
I'd start by checking the starter, maybe the brushes are worn or the contacts are bad. You can rebuild the stock starter with better contacts and new brushes for cheap.
I always had bad luck with aftermarket starters on these engines.

 

If its trying to turn over but cant then weak batteries are the first step. Brand new or not...batteries can be weak from sitting or have a bad cell depleting their capacity. As stated by others, a Dodge Cummins ISB sitting in the cold weather overnight with properly charged good batteries and a functional grid heater system can still start without plugging in the block heater down to as cold as -20*F.

 

As a quick and dirty check for the batteries I use a test light across the battery and watch it while trying to start- it may go a little dim, but if it goes out or is just a tiny orange-red dot you are overtaxing the battery.
Either the battery isn't full, or it is bad, or you draw too many amps because your starter is shorting internally.
If the test light does not change appreciably, the starter does not draw much power, meaning it has lost some internal connection- like starter contacts or brushes, burnt armature etc.

 

 

Refurbish the original starter yourself with a contact kit and brushes. They are good for almost eternity if refreshed on a regular basis.