'04 sedan - doesn't start, just clicks, even replaced battery
 

just my luck, car rolled over 60k last month and had to get it in the dealership this afternoon when it refused to start.

Sometimes the car clicks, sometimes it doesn't. I changed the battery - same problem.

Anyone have this problem before? Ideas?

I did notice in the last year, the car did hesitate to start at times. It cranked a little before stopped cranking at all. I coudn't really recreate the problem, it just happened randomly at times.

Today it just totally stopped working.. totally sucks =/

Dang. I'd check all fuses. Hopefully it's as simple as that. It also could be a bad ign switch that's not switching power to the starter. When you turn the key, do the dash light up but the starter just doesn't engage?

hi Jeff - long time :)

Yeah, everything lights up just fine when I turn the key ...tried turning the key over a bunch of times and just "clicking" , sometimes it does nothing.

:)

Hopefully it's a fuse related to the starter. Start digging. I think some of these fuses are down near the battery. ugh.

Could be the starter though. Bad solenoid?

well i'm f'd now ... it's at the stealership xD

Sounds like a bad starter

Maybe a bad ground.

Hmmmm Click click click sounds like starter. changed that on my old car it was makin the same sound. Started was actually working, if you knocked on it wit the back of the screw driver, but i wasnt doin that everytime lolol

Lols. I used to have a 10 year old 1980 celica and something similar happened. When the starter started to go, we gave it a few knocks and it would start again, but eventually we had to replace it.

i looked for the starter but it started raining in the parking lot ! I didn' tfind it .. was hoping to knock the solenoid. I will post back tomorrow when I hear from the dealer ...

Let us know when you find out. I have never heard of a starter going out on one.

My friend was just talking about a similar issue he had just recently. You mentioned changing the battery recently, have you checked to make sure that on the battery if either connector is loose enough to move, problem may be bad connection to the terminal.

yeah battery was totally ruled out ... checked fuse / threw in a new one / terminals / etc.


Dealer said it was a bad starter and has to replace ... going to take a day because it's very rare these things go out on the G's and there's none around at the moment.

ended up being $570 out the door.

Yikes, sorry to hear about that. But hey, at least they figured it out!

My car has been having a similiar but not quite the same problem lately. It starts to to crank but takes longer then usual and then proceeds to almost stall but never does. It had been real cold lately and I thought maybe the battery had trouble cranking the engine, but it even does it in when the car has been sitting in the heated garage all night. Hopefully I don't need a starter.