here’s a good one

customer has a avital 4000 installed in his 00 jeep wrangler.  when the vehicle is remote started the starter clicks once.  we tested it like 6mo ago when it was installed and found the 12v wires to be around 10v.  so we put the shop charger on the battery and it started like 15 times in a row.  we showed the customer and told them to have the entire charging system checked.  it starts a little rough with the key, but i think the current draw when the remote start engages might be too much to crank properly (possibly why it works on the charger).

YESTERDAY, customer calls back and says he had the battery and alternator checked and they are both fine... but the starter just clicks.  what the hell has he been doing for the last 6mo?  we tried a new brain way back then and it functioned the same.  we used a tach wire and even tried it on voltage for the hell of it.

any ideas on what we could recommend to him/check on? 

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MECP certified installer

Assuming the power and ground connections are still good, the first thing I would check would be the grounds for the battery. If all shows good then I would run power for the alarm and remote start directly to the battery, if this doesn't help then there is definately a problem with the battery or charging system.

6 months is along time to take the car to autozone to have it checked. But hey maybe he is just lazy.

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Certified Security Specialist
Always check info with a digital multimeter.
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Check the starter connection as well. If the wire is loose there or the power wire is loose, you won't get consitent starts. If the battery is sitting at around 10 V, then he should have gotten the battery replaced, not checked. That battery is as good as dead if it's that low ( testing at the terminals ). Now on the flip side, when you said that you checkd the power wire inside the Jeep at 10 V, what was the actual battery voltage at the terminals ?

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Jeff
Velocity Custom Home Theater
Mobile Audio/Video Specialist
Morden, Manitoba CANADA

thats some good stuff to look into. i think we tested 10v inside the jeep, i told him a battery/alternator test might not reveal anything. however, if there is corrosion on the ign haness somewhere that could cause a voltage drop. ill try taking the 12v+ to the battery if no one else at the shop has tried that.

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MECP certified installer

That's got to be just a bad battery hook it up to one of those charger/starter unit and see if everithing works fine   once that you start the car disconect the charger, check the voltage ant the battery terminal it should be 13-14.4 if you get that the charge sistem is ok, replace the battery.

test the battery with you meter see what voltage it gives you. looks like you should clean the pos. & neg. post on you battery they are probably corrosion build up that's why you are getting 10 volt read out at the steering column.