Starter motors

[BobE]

I'm going to replace the short/1.4KW starter motor on my 4 litre as it seems marginal for the job. (I'm also going to uprate the battery and the engine earths). The options are the longer 1.7KW version from TVR Parts or the heavy duty version from TVR Powers. Has anyone got real life experience of the latter compared the standard 'long' version as it's twice the price?

[m4tti]

BobE said:

I'm going to replace the short/1.4KW starter motor on my 4 litre as it seems marginal for the job. (I'm also going to uprate the battery and the engine earths). The options are the longer 1.7KW version from TVR Parts or the heavy duty version from TVR Powers. Has anyone got real life experience of the latter compared the standard 'long' version as it's twice the price?

Hi Bob, why do you think its marginal. What problems are you experiencing?

When I rebuilt and put my engine back this year I started experiencing hot start problems. For example drive the car for 20 - 30 mins stop for petrol and the car wont restart for 20 mins. Starting would be laboured and the voltage would drop. From cold it would start no problem and this was a rebuilt engine so tighter than run in.

I cleaned every earth point back to bare metal and used dielectric grease to seal them up. Hey presto starter flies round like never before, no matter the conditions. Theres plenty of heat soak in the engine bay which leads to increasing resistance. Couple that to poor earths and you get starting problems.

[BobE]

m4tti said:

BobE said:

I'm going to replace the short/1.4KW starter motor on my 4 litre as it seems marginal for the job. (I'm also going to uprate the battery and the engine earths). The options are the longer 1.7KW version from TVR Parts or the heavy duty version from TVR Powers. Has anyone got real life experience of the latter compared the standard 'long' version as it's twice the price?

Hi Bob, why do you think its marginal. What problems are you experiencing?

When I rebuilt and put my engine back this year I started experiencing hot start problems. For example drive the car for 20 - 30 mins stop for petrol and the car wont restart for 20 mins. Starting would be laboured and the voltage would drop. From cold it would start no problem and this was a rebuilt engine so tighter than run in.

I cleaned every earth point back to bare metal and used dielectric grease to seal them up. Hey presto starter flies round like never before, no matter the conditions. Theres plenty of heat soak in the engine bay which leads to increasing resistance. Couple that to poor earths and you get starting problems.

Hi Matt - I get two problems. The hot starting issue has just begun but I've also had problems with the engine starting from cold even though the car is left on a trickle charger. The starter really struggles to turn the engine over on occasion. I don't think it was co-incidence that TVR went from a BMW 3 series part to a 5 series higher output motor with the later cars. I've previously had similar issues with the Marcos I had - a 5 litre highly tuned Rover based engine and that was down to the starter motor gradually having heat degraded over a period of time due to very high under bonnet temperatures. I'll start with the cleaning the earths and I've been recommended to double up the earth leads. I think from all the records I have for the car the battery is the original so it's now 11 years old and so I think it prudent to replace it rather than have it die on me at an inopportune time.

[m4tti]

Yep definitely worth tackling it in stages, battery, earths, starter motor.

I was amazed at how much difference cleaning the earth points made as I thought it would make bugger all difference, with the car happily starting from cold.

[PetrolHeadPete]

Get the 1.7kw one in there
You won't look back
Buy from eBay
The small extra length makes no practical difference
I had hot start issues 5 or so years back but never since changing

[AlanQ]

I had the Powers upgrated one fitted and it makes a massive difference. Even after checking/replacing all the earth straps the original still gave me a will/it won't moment on every hot start. The Powers job cranks it really quickly hot or cold.

[BobE]

I've now got all the parts - the uprated/long starter from TVR Parts, and a new battery and engine earth strap. I've got the old battery out - it's got a TVR label on the top so it looks like the original. I'm replacing it with one of these:
http://www.halfords.com/motoring/bulbs-wiper-blade...
It's the same size as the one that came out with same terminal orientation. I can see why people switch the latter but on my car there is no way the live cable would stretch to fit a terminal position on the 'outside' of the car. Also an 096 size battery based on the dimensions on the specs wouldn't fit my car even with the lower lugs removed and I can just imagine the arguments that would happen to the guarantee if I did the latter.
I've been cleaning up all the earth terminals in the battery bay - and I've got two questions. There are three earth cables on my car that go the chassis stud on the diagonal member but one of these cables then goes to another stud at the top left hand side of the battery area at the end of the foot-well. What is this earth and if I loosen the nut will I have to dismantle the car in the passenger foot-well to re-tighten it? Secondly it's not at all obvious where the engine earth is located - can someone point me in it's direction please?
I've also removed and checked the Anderson socket - on my car it's in perfect condition, (thank goodness).

[BobE]

All now completed with the exception of doubling up the earth straps from the engine to the chassis. I used this thread as a guide when fitting the uprated starter motor:
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?f=5&a...
The job isn't too involved but you definitely want to disconnect the battery first and you need both long and short allen key sockets - the long ones to release the two large upper air box brackets and the short ones with an extension bar to remove the starter mounting bolts. You also need to be able to turn up some spacers to bring the rear lower air box bracket back to it's original position and I also did the same for the clutch bleed flexible pipe. I found you didn't need to disturb the ignition pack - just un-clip the lower plug to gain access to the upper starter motor bolt. The new motor has two very long bolts that you need to carefully remove and then relocate the plate that holds the alternator fuse and the previously mentioned bracket. I used a couple of washers to space the bracket off the rear of the starter to clear a small screw head. You also need to remove one of the 'rivnuts' that holds the fuse holder in place. I swung the holder round slightly and used a new drilled and tapped mounting hole in the bracket to install a stud in place of the bolt. You also need to again use a couple of washers to allow the fuse holder to sit correctly off the bracket as it did when tightened down onto the rivnut that has been removed.
The result of changing the battery and upgraded starter motor was a huge increase in how fast the engine now turns over - I can't imagine it's ever going to struggle again but I'll still do the extra earth starp when the weather improves and can get the car up on my ramps.

[The Surveyor]

Your problems sounded exactly the same as I was having. Mine just needed a new battery and now the original starter-motor spins quicker than ever, and is certainly up to the job of starting the Speed 6. My battery was only 2 years old and had been trickle-charged most of the time but it had clearly 'gone-off' and wasn't giving the oomph to turn over the starter.

When you were doing the work, did you try the old starter with the new battery?

Glad it's sorted

Paul

[BobE]

The Surveyor said:

Your problems sounded exactly the same as I was having. Mine just needed a new battery and now the original starter-motor spins quicker than ever, and is certainly up to the job of starting the Speed 6. My battery was only 2 years old and had been trickle-charged most of the time but it had clearly 'gone-off' and wasn't giving the oomph to turn over the starter.

When you were doing the work, did you try the old starter with the new battery?

Glad it's sorted

Paul

Hi Paul - yes I did and it was an improvement but it didn't turnover as quickly as it now does. My view was I wanted to overkill the issue and an extra 20% of starter motor power seems to have been the final solution. (I'm also sure TVR didn't change to the more powerful motor without a good reason). I've still got a few other issues on the car to sort out but hopefully I won't have to return to starting problems again - I hope!

[drivingfroggy]

I realise that I'm way late arriving at this topic,but I fitted a starter motor from an M5 in ine and it's really good, it's just the airbox bracket doesn't fit properly

[BobE]

drivingfroggy said:

I realise that I'm way late arriving at this topic,but I fitted a starter motor from an M5 in ine and it's really good, it's just the airbox bracket doesn't fit properly

I'm presuming it's the same type of starter motor that I've fitted and it's longer than the one it replaced and has some detail differences at the rear. Because it's longer I turned up some brass spacers to move the airbox bracket back to its original position as noted in my earlier post. The alternative would be to drill two new holes in the lower airbox but it wouldn't be that easy to mark the new locations.