CalSpeed aka Michael asks:
> I was wondering if the following sound means my starter is gettin' ready to
> call it quits!
>
> Schreech...! Vrr... Vrr. Vroom!
Could be that your wallet is about to call it quits.. :-)
One possible explanation is that the ring gear has worn down
its teeth, and then as the bendix gear in the starter also wears,
there's no longer enough metal to fully mesh.
Replacing just the starter will improve things for awhile, until
the bad ring gear chews up the starter's gears again.
You'll often find that there's only a small area of the ring gear that's
bad. Due to slight differences in engine balance and compression,
they oftentimes stop in the same place when you shut them down.
Thus, the same small area of the ring gear gets used for the initial
engagement again and again and again.
If you hit the key and get a screech instead of a vroom, put the
car in gear, push it a foot (causing the ring gear to shift), and try
again. Oh wait, you in San Francisco - if you try this, you'll just roll
down the hill!
-- John
John F Sandhoff sandhoff@csus.edu Sacramento, CA
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