beavertail

Trucks been real hard to crank lately with the cooler nights. Slow turns then barely fires. My trucks stranded right now. now, I turn on the key barely any volts register. I'm not sure why that happens. But when hooked up to jump it off I have 14-16 volts register. Go to crank it and it barely turns over 2-3 times then stops and clicks.

About a month ago I replaced a battery, one was leaking and dead. I have no idea how or when it died. I didn't really notice a change in cranking/driving, but when I did brake work on it I noticed thebattery leaking anyway, could have damaged the starter during that?

Now I'm trying to jump it off, it turns 2-3 time real slow then stops turning and clicks. I'm thinking the starter has slowly went bad and with short drives I've ran my baterries down. I cant' really think of why I only have 8 amps.

Please help.

luke03cr

It sounds to me like you have 1 or 2 dead batterys. the fact that your only puting out about 8 volts and its barly turning ovr is a good sign of that. CTD rquire alot of amps to turn our high compression engines ovr, thats why the batteries are rated so high in amps. If it was your starter u more then likly wld just get a click when u turn ovr the key and nothing else(usuly the contacts). wat u need to do it get a good battery charger and charge them BOTH up to proper voltage. Then when u get it fired up and running, take a 15 to 20 mile trip round town and make sure that your alternator is properly charging the batterries. i wld turn ur headlights and other elec. acc. on and monitor your voltage reading as your going down the road to make sure alternator is up to par.

beavertail

Thanks. i thought it was batteries too. But when i hooked it up to jump it off the volts were a little above normal at about 16. The starter still wouldn't engage it, it would try to turn and then click,click.

luke03cr

u very well may nt b pushing enuf amps from the "donor" batteries. if your starter is trying to turn then it shld b good bc its trying to engage. It sounds like u dont have strong enuf donor batteries to put out the amps required to turn the engine. You show 16 volt bc thats wat the donor vehicle is pumping out, but its nt volts that make the power to turn the starter, its the amps. Thats why our trucks require high cca battiers, but there all 12v. think of it as a garden hose, volts is like water pressure and amps is the force of the water coming out the end of the hose

patdaly

What they said, one other thing, a weak battery will kill a starter........ Cranking slow is hard on them.

Hate to say it, but my policy has always been replace my Batteries in pairs.

beavertail

you guys are exactly right. thanks for the great advice. My driver side battery was completely shot to !@%$%^. I think it was probably so bad that it was fouling everything up, even when I was trying to jump it.

New battery, and it fires right up. I also think it fixed my fuel shutoff problem. I was having to manually do it about 3 out of 10 cranks. But since the new battery after about 15 cranks, I haven't had to do it. Truck seems to run a lot better also.

I've been real busy traveling trying to keep my job and I've neglected my truck. Do you guys think I may have damaged anything else?

patdaly

You might have shortened the starter life some, but I wouldn't get excited unless she doesn't whip right over with the new batts.

12 Valves are like your favorite Dog, they don't ask much, just a pet once in a while.........

infidel

Low voltage kills starter contacts, I would replace them.
http://www.fostertruck.com/dodge/default.htm

For the future, your normal run of the mill jumper cables won't flow enough juice to start a CTD with two dead batteries.
You have to invest in some heavy duty jumpers.

totalloser

Batteries SHOULD ALWAYS BE REPLACED IN PAIRS. This is because the old battery will draw the new one down to the same condition as the old one.