What the hell is going on!!!!!!

[British Bob]

Hi,

Havnt got any recent one's, Will see if I can get a push from some japanese tourists, they have always got camera's.

BB

 

[Heavy Duty]

Thanks.

Will stick with this, cause when its hot and sunny and the roof is down and you hear people shouting "Nice car mate" as you drive past them its all worth it.

However the last week or so, the people have been shouting "Need a push!!!" which doesnt do much for the ego.

BB

I know the feeling. When it works as advertised it is great. But when things go South then you have to defend the ego.

Most people know that problems can occure with anything mechanical and the more complex the item the more likley it will fail. But sticking to the basics is the first approach when trying to diagnose a problem. Don't go looking for the Zebra just yet.

H.D.

 

[British Bob]

By the way, that picture of yours, was that the last time you saw your car.???

BB

 

[Dakota kid]

Hi,

Havnt got any recent one's, Will see if I can get a push from some japanese tourists, they have always got camera's.

BB

dont they always

 

[Heavy Duty]

Hi,

Havnt got any recent one's, Will see if I can get a push from some japanese tourists, they have always got camera's.

BB

That would be funny. You could always say "Here is a pic of me conserving fuel by ALLOWING tourists to push the vette":L .

H.D.

 

[Dakota kid]

Hi,

Havnt got any recent one's, Will see if I can get a push from some japanese tourists, they have always got camera's.

BB

I could see the caption now “GM testing new Flintstone hybrid corvette ”:L

 

[British Bob]

Ha Ha,

Not a bad Idea, Gona get my mechanic to fit some pedals!!

BB

 

[Achilles]

I had a similar experience with my 86 in that my battery kept going dead. Turned out of all the stupid things, the map light on the driver's side door panel was stuck on and I never new it. Once I figured it out and pushed the lens off, I still had the same problem. I realized that the switch for the map light must have been worn out and everytime I would reach for the door handle, my hand would inadvertantly touch the lens & turn the map light on. So the battery would go dead. Mind you, this car gets driven maybe once a week, so I wasn't aware of the light being on. I've since taken the bulb out...problem solved. Sometimes it can be the simplest things that cause the greatest frustration.

Good luck.

 

[British Bob]

HI,

Thats just what my girl friend says!

BB

 

[British Bob]

Battery?

Hi guys,

The bloke looking at my car just phoned me to say that he has checked everything, there is no drain or short or non working device on the car any where.

Cause I live in england the original AC delco front conecting batteries cost a fortune so as I think I mentioned earlier I bought a top connecting battery which on paper is more powerfull than the old AC Delco.

Had to bolt some extentions onto the original leads to convert the conections and this guy has said that the cables are dropping a volt on each cable after my joins.

The thing is that I put a slightly more powerfull battery in the car last sept with older and thinner extentions again bolted to the original cables and it started the car like this up until last week.

What should the battery be in my vet in terms of its cranking things?

BB

 

[British Bob]

Update

Hi again,

He has phoned again.

He has rigged up tempory connections to simulate new cables from battery to starter etc...... said that there has been a mild improvement , he expected this to cure things, it did not.

Said that the engine obviously has a high compression and needs a big amount of energy to turn it over.

The system works with a fully charged battery but seems that the system is pulling a hell of a lot of power from the battery and leads and the joints I made are getting hot.

Any idea's

British Bob. :confused

 

[Heavy Duty]

Bob,
if the battery cables/leads/terminals are getting hot that means either there is a poor ground some where, weak battery, bad starter, bad cables. Make sure that the replacement starter is the one recommended for the car. I know that there are serveral listings for starters for that year on GM cars. Make sure that the one you have is the correct one. My battery has 950 cranking amps. It does take a lot of amps to start these cars after they get hot. What I would do is get the car from the mech, take it for a 30-40 minute drive, come back and see if you can duplicate the problem. Hopefully it will repeat the problem and allow you to get it corrected.


Good luck and hang in there.

H.D.

 

[89vert]

I'm still thinking battery. Maybe a defective battery, broken plates as mentioned earlier. Or not enough cold cranking amps. Also someone had thought of, the cables being hot as an indication of a bad ground. I agree that a bad ground creating extra resistance and causing the starter to draw more current. Also low voltage at the battery would cause the same thing. Hope you get this fixed and back on the road. Tim

 

[Jeb]

Your mechanic should be able to measure the amps being drawn by the starter but that would not explain why the car would die after being started and run for a while.

It's possible, I suppose, that you got a bad starter which is shorted out internally and would cause a drain on the battery. Your mechanic should be able to test this rather easily.

Good luck!

 

[Dakota kid]

I would check all you electronic connections every single one, as my electronic instructor told me trouble shooting is a B*** if you don’t know where to start. You defiantly have a short some where.

 

[G Winter]

The heat where you made the connections on the battry cables is not good. Where there is heat there is a bad connection or resistance at that point. Under normal conditions you could have 200 to 500 amps draw when you crank.Resistance causes higher draw. This in turn drops available volts to the coil. If I remember right, get down to the 10 volt area at the coil and it might not start.

 

[redc4corvette]

Bob if you drove the car 45 minutes and battery went dead ,the altanator dioads are shorting one or 2 of them are dead.If car sits over night and is hard starting in AM alt is shot.

Battery could be shorting an inside plate to ground but that is rare unless you have an 86.Mine reversed the polarity a month ago and that cost me and alt and battery.

 

[British Bob]

Thanks Guys

Morning ,

The car is at the garage again for another day.

will post updates as I get them for your experienced comment.

Cheers

BB

 

[Achilles]

Your mechanic should be able to measure the amps being drawn by the starter but that would not explain why the car would die after being started and run for a while.

It's possible, I suppose, that you got a bad starter which is shorted out internally and would cause a drain on the battery. Your mechanic should be able to test this rather easily.

Good luck!

I experienced very hard starting from my 86 once, and my mechanic hooked up some test equipment to the battery and said that my starter was drawing an ungoddly amount of amps form the battery, indicating a bad starter. I put in a new starter from NAPA (lifetime warranty). Car starts great now.

Bob, unless your car is not stock, the compression is around 9.5 to 1, which isn't very high when you consider the LT-1 has a higher compression ratio and mine starts right up everytime. I would throw that logic out.

I don't know if your mechanic has a loaner battery that you can try for few days or not. But I would suggest it is a bad starter.