2007 Honda, had an appointment next week to service, check out what seemed to be a minor starting problem, but DW has been using it OK until this evening. Costco parking lot, 9 miles up the hiway, dead as a doornail. So I brought my tools, jump starter, battery load tester… Battery is fine, but just no Rrrrrr’ing… No click, nothing…
Gave up, called for a AAA tow to home, since our repair shop is closed… Do another tow tomorrow if the shop doesn’t have their own… Some days are tough…
If the battery is dead, then it could be your alternator. If the battery is not dead, it could be your starter. I remember when you take your car to Sears and they would put it on a machine and tell you if the alternator or battery was bad. Does anyone know if there is a company that still does that? Thanks…doc
Autozone is reported to do some tests like battery.
If battery is not dead, could be starter or starter relay or maybe even fuse.
Battery was OK, I happen to have a load tester, took it with to the Costco parking lot and it was fine… Last evening, not even a click, so this morning checked again and there was a click of the solenoid, but no action. AAA came a little bit ago and took it to the local repair shop… I called them earlier so we’ll see how it works out. I see new started for $2-300m so a bit of labor on that, should be about $500 or less. Old days I would have jacked it up, replaced it myself, but these days, rather let the shop handle it…
A side note on that battery load tester, I ordered it handsome other bits to check my trailer’s 6V batteries before going camping. Amazon lost the package, so I went to Pep Boys, bought one locally, sure enough the shipment arrived after all, but it was after they had refunded the charges, since it was lost… So now I have 2 of them, will give the extra to my son or SIL, … It was handy, quick check on the batteries, thought the Honda one had died, but it’s OK…
Thanks for responding… This Category, along with the Building/Maintaining a Home need to be kept going, hopefully some more will find their way around this setup… Hate lose touch with so many good folks out there…
weco
Called the shop before closing, talked to the owner, they were tied up all day had just got it on the rack, was about to go to Honda to pick up a new starter. He does not like, has not had good luck with 3rd party starters on Hondas, and I agreed to go for the gold, I want it dependable, not have to mess with further tows, etc… He’ll also do the full service tomorrow, since it was already scheduled for next week, save a trip across town…
Found a decent video, I expect the Starter itself to be ~$400, maybe more, but after watching this, I’ll happily pay the price… Not terrible with a lift, but on stands, no thanks…
I was wondering where the starter was on a honda having never owned one. Its in the standard position under the engine. Its really not too bad to change it out, but that was a smart move to have the shop do it. Theres just a few bolts holding it on and some wires to control it and deliver power. Nice video with all the right size wrenches for the job. Glad that is done for you…doc
In the luckiest case it’s a bad fuse. But the alternator is just a different version of generator; if there’s no “click” then the solenoid that fires up the starter motor is gone. That integral to most, so replace the whole starter is the right answer.
In my not very advanced opinion, of course, although I did once take a course from “the Car Guys” before they were “the Car Guys”; they ran a garage and classes for hippies in Cambridge on how to service your own. I had a VW, my girlfriend had a Karmann Ghia; we took the class together. Alas, the cars outlasted the relationship.
When I first went to ‘rescue’ my DW in the Costco parking lot, there was not even a click, nor was there when the AAA driver tried a few things I had a battery load tester, so I’d verified the battery was OK, but I had no clue then where the starter was on the Civic. The AAA driver called and asked, or maybe just googled and fount it was on the passenger side, banged on it a bit to see if it would make contact, it didn’t, so he loaded it up, met us back at home… Next morning a different AAA driver tried again, before he loaded it, and there was a clicking of the solenoid, but still no spin up, loaded it, took it to the shop… So likely it just gave up. Shop is replacing it today, and hopefully doing the next scheduled service as long as it’s there.
We bought this used from our local Honda dealer, replacing an earlier Accord V6, some dingbat ran a red light, wied out the front end, messed up the frame, so the Insurance totaled it. Too bad as it was a top end, leather seats, moon roof, really nice car, great running V6, but if it can’t be insured, it wasn’t worth fixing… So this 4 cyl has served DW well, I swapped the battery a while back regularly serviced, only 119K on the odometer… But we are perusing a replacement, PHEV or EV…
I worked PT at a friends gas station (Signal/Exxon) after HS, messed with cars motorcyles since I was maybe 16 or so, helped with engine swaps, and worked in tech stuff, from small jobs to multi-floor, multi-million dollar projects complete with JIT, Just In Time, planning… Bro’s '45 Willy’s Jeep is still kicking along, altho I just heard that it needs some attention… He worked the CAT electrical systems so has haywired in extra generators, batteries for his electric winch… Me, I’d strip it all out, put in a whole new loom rather than mess with the ancient wiring… He’s left us, a couple years now, his kids re nearly clueless as far as the wiring, so I don’t know what’s to become of the poor thing now… Time marches on…
It lives on the passenger side, tucked way up in there, Shop called out 2 hours labor to ro the R&R…
Car is back home, Serviced, and working fine, only negative note is that the tires are aging out, need to be replaced, they noted some flakiness, and it has been a while… So I see a Bridgestone Sale at Costco, away we go…
Total bill for the remove, replace, servicing, labor, filters, synthetic oil and all = $1194, $580 of it for the Honda Starter itself… Towing, twice, was all covered by the AAA insurance…
Update, as long as I was poking around, I looked at the Costco site, and as luck has it, the Bridgestone $150 discount for a set of 4 is active! The $165 ea/$660 for 4 - Escopia EP422+ came to 205/55R16 come out to $562 for the set, after discount plus tax… Just have to schedule the mounting…
Update: Tire replacement, no open slots until Sunday @ 4:30 PM… Busy place!
I was wondering what the cost was for that starter. I just replaced my alternator in my Tundra and it was in the same price range. The nice thing is that these parts usually last almost forever in these vehicles…doc