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STARTER TROUBLESHOOTING
You're in a hurry to get somewhere dressed in your very best. You hop in the car turn the key and hear nothing. Your eyes immediately move to the headlight switch knob, which is in the off position. You look down at the speedometer to check the oil and generator lights, both are brightly illuminated. Next, you turn on the headlights which brightly illuminate the surrounding scenery.
Confused and angry at the situation, you pound firmly upon the horn button hoping to hear a voice of reason. Your car answers with a sheepish beep, holding the secrets of the apparent dilemma inside. What you are experiencing is commonly referred to as a "hard start" problem. While the symptoms are almost always as we have outlined above, several components, or more likely a combination of components can be attributed to the
cause.
First, let's look at the heart of the system, the starter.
Starters are a very misunderstood electrical component. Bosch claims that warranty returns on starters are mistakenly exchanged in over 50% of the cases. A starter motor is a basic electric motor with a few peculiarities that we should explain. Mounted to the top of the starter motor is a small round cylindrically shaped device known as the solenoid. The solenoid is an electric gadget that engages the sliding gear of the starter into the ring gear of the flywheel, while supplying current to the starter motor at a precise moment. As you can see, the solenoid really has two distinct functions, movement of the drive gear into the flywheel and to supply current to the starter motor itself.
Unique to the VW supplied starter motor is the way the armature is supported. Most starter motors support the armature on both ends with a self-contained bearing/bushing. All Beetle models with the exception of those possessing the automatic stick shift option support the gear side of the starter with a bushing located in the transmission housing. Bus models used this type of configuration through 1971. Critical to proper operation of the starter, this bushing is often over looked due to the difficulty involved with regards to replacement. It is a good rule to inspect and or replace this bushing whenever the engine is removed from the vehicle, and always when replacing
the starter.
HOW CURRENT FLOWS
THROUGH THE STARTER CIRCUIT.
Voltage from the battery is carried to the ignition switch via a heavy red wire. From the ignition switch, voltage is sent to the starter solenoid. The starter solenoid first moves the starter gear into the flywheel ring gear and secondly applies. current from the positive battery cable to the starter motor, thus rotating the flywheel in an effort to start the engine. One important concept to remember is that the ignition switch only supplies current to the solenoid. The solenoid is what does all the work, in terms of switching the
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