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I’m new here, I hope I’m posting this in the right spot.
I have a 1996 f150.
I ran into a problem while replacing my starter. my old starter has the 3 posts, the ground, the larger wire post and the smaller wire post. The new one only has a ground, the larger wire post and a flat peice that sticks out where the small wire post should be. The new starter is a remanufactured motorcraft. I just need to know if there’s anything I can do, or do I need to find a another starter?
And that's not a ground. Power goes to the big post furthest away from the starter. When you put power to the little spade it actuates the solenoid and power goes through the solenoid and into the starter windings through that wire on the inner big post (which is what I think you're calling a ground).
There's no ground wire in that picture; grounding is done through the body of the starter to the engine block. Just so you know.
Thanks for clarifying. I figured that wasn’t the ground after looking at it again. Some guy off YouTube called it a ground, but we all know how reliable YouTube information is
What exactly is the problem that makes you want to replace the starter? While it's off, you should also clean the ring terminal on the heavy Red cable:
The starter still works, but I’m replacing it because I’m getting a grinding noise every now and then. I did inspect the flywheel while The starter was off and from what I understand small rounded edges on the teeth is normal wear?
Thanks again.
Last edited by Mason Simonet; Oct 18, 2018 at 10:48 AM.
"...every now & then..." like while driving around? That's not a starter problem. While cranking? Still not likely a starter problem. But you should attempt to re-create the noise while listening with the hood up, or while you're underneath with a mechanic's stethoscope to pinpoint the source instead of just swapping the starter.
No one can tell you it's normal without seeing pics of it. I just pulled the original flywheel from a 250Kmi '95 5.8L, and I couldn't see any wear at all.
Most of the time I will hear grinding for a split second at the end of cranking, but sometimes I will turn the key and all I get is a grind/whine noise with no crank, then I’ll try again and it will start up fine. It would be hard to re create the noise, it only happens like 3 - 4 times a month.
I would get a pic of the flywheel, but I already put back on the old starter because this is my daily. After looking at some other forum posts I think the amount of wear on mine would not cause any problems.
Last edited by Mason Simonet; Oct 19, 2018 at 12:42 PM.
Replacing the starter
