Engine/Ignition problem

[Breals]

Having brought the boat back to Worcester without a hitch, it won't start. It's not the batteries; jump starting, fitting a new battery (the old one was definitely on its way out), and cleaning the contacts have not helped. There's plenty of diesel in the tank.

 

It starts to turn over but fails to start proper. The prop turns slightly during attempts to start it (is this normal?) Any ideas? Its a Renault 1.9, btw.

[bottle]

Having brought the boat back to Worcester without a hitch, it won't start. It's not the batteries; jump starting, fitting a new battery (the old one was definitely on its way out), and cleaning the contacts have not helped. There's plenty of diesel in the tank.

 

It starts to turn over but fails to start proper. The prop turns slightly during attempts to start it (is this normal?) Any ideas? Its a Renault 1.9, btw.

33729[/snapback]

 

But is the fuel getting to the engine, check lines, filters etc

The filters may need cleaning, also the lines, are there any leaks/broken pipes.

[Breals]

Thanks, that does make sense. I'll make sure those possibilities are rules out before any attempt to fit a new starter motor or anything like that. Engine needs a thorough service anyway for my own peace of mind.

Edited October 5, 2005 by Breals

[Big COL]

Hi Breals

 

If it's a manual stop via a cable check that it is returning the lever right home on the injector pump.

[John Orentas]

Come on Breals give us a few clues, does the engine spin round, if it does is there any smoke, what colour. ???

[Breals]

The starter motor turns but sounds laboured and dies before it has a chance to start the engine properly. The prop turns a couple of times, or attempts to, for some reason (although its in neutral). No smoke (ignition does not occur anyway), and the engine only gave off a very small amount of smoke (white in colour) when it was underway, before these problems started.

 

The engine stop is via the ignition key, as in the van it was originally installed in.

 

Lucky for me I'm moored right opposite an auto mechanics. They were having a look today and suggested a lazy starter motor (as did an RCR attendant yesterday) but I would like to rule out anything more easily rectifiable first! Certainly the starter motor was man enough for the job while out cruising. Perhaps some sediment has been stirred up and blocked the fuel line as botle suggested.

 

I was happy that the boat had a renault engine as I've always had renault cars (a 5 and a clio) and never had a single problem with them. This marinised diesel one is another kettle of poisson.

Edited October 5, 2005 by Breals

[bottle]

The starter motor turns but sounds laboured and dies before it has a chance to start the engine properly. The prop turns a couple of times, or attempts to, for some reason (although its in neutral). No smoke (ignition does not occur anyway), and the engine only gave off a very small amount of smoke (white in colour) when it was underway, before these problems started.

 

The engine stop is via the ignition key, as in the van it was probably originally installed in.

 

Lucky for me I'm moored right opposite an auto mechanics. They were having a look today and suggested a lazy starter motor (as did an RCR attendant yesterday) but I would like to rule out anything more easily rectifiable first!

 

I was happy that the boat had a renault engine as I've always had renault cars (a 5 and a clio) and never had a single problem with them. This marinised diesel one is another kettle of poisson.

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Lazy starter motor, check and clean all electrical connections and motor mountings, these are used to 'earth' the motor sometimes.

[Breals]

The connections on the earth lead were cleaned and soldered by the RCR man yesterday. As the engine needs servicing I'll get the garage to double check everything's clean. Fuel lines and filters.

 

I'm drawing the line at doing anything further to it myself. I dropped a spanner when I was tensioning the alternator earlier, it connected with something, causing one of the wires coming from the alternator to catch fire and the spanner to melt at the point of contact!

Edited October 5, 2005 by Breals

[bottle]

Lesson

 

Always disconnect batteries when working on or near engine

[Breals]

Yes, I'll be much more careful in future, I was lucky I wasn't actually holding the spanner. Luckily the flame on the cable died out almost instantly, but the spanner was very hot indeed.

[Breals]

I wonder what the mechanics will come up with tomorrow. Everyone who has looked at the engine has ended up just staring at it, stroking their chins.

[John Orentas]

Lazy starter motor? I must say it looks to me like the battery isn't up to the job get a new fully charged battery and/or connect a second one in parallel with the first, few engines will start without a good spin round. Only then if it still won't start you can you start looking for other problems.

 

The prop-shaft turning slowly whilst in neutral isn't uncommon but not normally until the engine has started, but it is unlikely to be connected to the starting problem.

Edited October 5, 2005 by John Orentas

[Yamanx]

This problem is right up my street, unfortunately for me on more than one ocassion

 

First off you must have a good starter battery.

 

A few things about boats in particular, unlike other vehicles.

 

The terminals at each end of the main battery cables may be crimped. On a boat that is exposed to high levels of damp this really does effect the conection between terminal and cable. Even, as I found on my current project, when soldered these will be effected by corrosion that you may not notice by looking at.

 

Other factors are the voltages between starter solenoid and whatever system you are using for energising it. For istance if the charging system is through a relay then it is possible the starter switch (Ignition key) when turned goes through the split charging relay. If this is so it can reduce the voltage to under twelve volts. Dont know why but it can. This may result in a slow starter.

 

Also there is usually a small length of thickish high voltage cable between starter solenoid and starter motor, even when they are piggy backed together. This will get very hot, especially if the voltage is low and the motor wants to draw too many amps, it is possible for this small bit of cable to become burnt, corroded etc. and require replacing.

 

If it was me and I was trying to diagnose the slow starter turning over problem I would try the following before I decided it was a knackered starter, which it may be.

 

1. Make sure all the battery connections are sound, bypass all your isolator switches by undoing one side and bolting them together effectively running a direct live from your starter battery to the starter and an earth from the battery to your engine earth. (Been there and took ages to find the isolator switch was corroded inside and making a poor connection)

 

2. On the starter solenoid is two connections, one is the main battery cable and the other is from the starter switch and requires energising to activate the solenoid. Run a wire from this connection hold it in your hand and touch it to live on your starter battery, it should spin the starter as fast as normal.

 

If not is is likely your starter is u/s if it spins as it should, then work back to eliminate back connections or relay.

 

Good luck. PM me if you have further queries but I have fixed this exact problem on two different boats and in two different ways so far

[alan_fincher]

I'm putting my head above the parapet here, because I don't have the wealth of experience of others on this forum,

 

But the following is based on something similar that I went through just recently....

 

Put a voltmeter across the battery you are using to (attempt to!) start with, then watch what happens as you engage the starter.

 

If the volts drop significantly at the battery when you are trying to start the engine, then the battery may well not be up to the job.

 

If that looks OK, (i.e. no dramatic volts drop when starter is turning), then I'd try again, but this time measuring the volts actually being received at the starter motor.

 

So put the voltmeter between the positive terminal on the starter itself, (wired to the solenoid), and earth. (Be VERY careful not to do another attempted welding job here! - If the battery is in good condition, you can draw a phenomenal current if you create a short to earth).

 

If there's an equally, (or almost equally) good voltage there, then it may well be that the starter motor is knackered, I'd have thought.

 

But if you have a significantly different voltage at the motor, from what you have across the battery, then there must be some point in between where the volts aren't getting through.

 

In the case I had, the internal contacts that are made inside the solenoid had become corroded with damp, and probable lack of use, and the contact was often bad enough not to spin the motor up properly, (but intermittent, in my case, depending upon exactly how the contacts came together each time, it seems).

 

I'm not suggesting that this fault is what you have, but if you measure volts at any possible point of loss from batery to motor, you should find a good clue to the problem I think.

 

Don't forget that any volts loss doesn't have to be in the positive side. A bad cable connection on the earth side could also cause battery volts to look OK, but for there not to be enough across the starter itself.

[Yamanx]

Don't forget that any volts loss doesn't have to be in the positive side.  A bad cable connection on the earth side could also cause battery volts to look OK, but for there not to be enough across the starter itself.

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Thats a very good point, it can be usual when measuring voltage with a meter to make a live connection with the meter to the live point at the starter and choose any convenient earth on the hull, whatever, with the other end. Forgetting that the earth also needs to be fed from the battery to the engine equally as good.

[rayman]

get a known sound battery, good quality jump leads, and go straight to your starter, that will tell you a few things.

[Breals]

Great answers, thanks. As I said a suitable fully charged battery was used, but this has probably been discharged a bit because of the many attempts to start the engine. I think its reading just over 12v on the voltmeter. I will be getting a portable jumpstarter and running that in paralell with the battery bank, once all the connections have been checked.

[bottle]

Hi Breals

 

A fully charged battery will read in the area of 13v(12v battery), I think as you suspect your battery is now a little 'tired'.

 

Maybe an idea to get it fully charged before proceeding but of course this will take time.

[gralyn]

 

The engine stop is via the ignition key, as in the van it was originally installed in.

 

Isn't there a possibility that the fuel cutoff on the injector pump is not being disengaged by the ignition switch. I think I recall that if there are no 12v the system is always in the stop mode.

Regards Graham.

[Breals]

 

Had a look down below, a lot of the contacts look dirty but this cable (the thick black one on the right) appeared to be in particularly poor nick. Any ideas what the cable is and whether it might be a source of my problems?

Edited October 6, 2005 by Breals

[alan_fincher]

 

Had a look down below, a lot of the contacts look dirty but this cable (the thick black one on the right) appeared to be in particularly poor nick.  Any ideas what the cable is and whether it might be a source of my problems?

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A bit hard to see, as I'm seeing the picture cropped quite tightly.

 

It looks like the black cable I think you are talking about is an outer sheath around a number of others, including the (fatter) Yellow feed from the solenoid.

 

Is that right, or am I misreading it? Do a number of separate insulated cables dissapear inside this black sheath ? Which ones visible in the picture ?

 

Also....

 

Just checking, but has the cable from the right hand side of the solenoid into the motor itself been disconnected and the state of the terminal underneath fully checked.

 

It looks like the nut has been recently disturbed, but it all looks pretty mucky, and the cable itself possibly not too clever ?

Edited October 6, 2005 by alan_fincher

[Breals]

Sorry the cable I was referring to is the one terminating at the starter motor - the insulation feels a bit loose as if the wire inside is corroded. The nut at the back had been removed by me(now replaced). The cable at the bottom is indeed a sheath covering various cables from the batteries.

 

I had removed the nut from the back of the starter to attempt to remove the cable, but it seemed stuck and I didn't want to inadvertently damage anything. The nut attaching it to what you have confirmed as the solenoid is almost impossible to access with the spanner, so I thought I'd consult before struggling to remove it.

Edited October 6, 2005 by Breals

[Breals]

[alan_fincher]

Sorry the cable I was referring to is the one terminating at the starter motor - the insulation feels a bit loose as if the wire inside is corroded. The nut at the back had been removed by me(now replaced). The cable at the bottom is indeed a sheath covering various cables from the batteries.

 

I had removed the nut from the back of the starter to attempt to remove the cable, but it seemed stuck and I didn't want to inadvertently damage anything. The nut attaching it to what you have confirmed as the solenoid is almost impossible to access with the spanner, so I thought I'd consult before struggling to remove it.

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Well the way I'm seeing the picture, the one you are talking about is on the LEFT, not on the RIGHT (as you said), hence my confusion

 

The thick black cable, with termination, (connected under the yellow and red ones, just to be sure we are taking the same language now!), is the feed from the battery, (via whatever isolation or selector switches you have) to the starter.

 

If there is any doubt about the integrity of that cable, it could be your problem. (I'm kinda surprised that someone remade the earth return cable, but hasn't scrutinised this one). As another poster said, whether that connector is crimped on, or soldered, either can suffer in boat conditions.

 

But this is where a voltmeter check would help. If you (CAREFULLY), measure volts between the projecting end of the screw thread on the left terminal, and earth, it should be very close to that across your battery terminals. If the voltage here falls massively as you engage the starter, but the volts at the battery end stay up, then you have a poor connection somewhere in between.

 

Depending upon how much current you manage to get through, and how long for, you might find that the offending joint gets quite hot, as it will be acting like a resistor, (don't get burn't!)

 

By the way you don't need a sophisticated or very accurate multimeter for this. Something bort in a DIY store or Maplins for under ten quid should be more than good enough to differentiate between (say) 12.5 volts (OK) and (perhaps) 10 volts (almost certainly not OK)

 

And if volts are OK up to that clean thread on the left, then I'd definitely want to take the cable on the one on the right off, and check the state under there. This needs a ring spanner, or a socket from a smaller sized socket set, which will grip all sides of the nut, if corroded on. Don't try pliers, wrenches, etc, because it'll probably get chewed up.

[DHutch]

Well the way I'm seeing the picture...

Im not seeing the picture?