Intermittent No Start With Click Sound [SOLVED - corrosion on cable]

A Q45 forum / Cima forum for the President of Infiniti's lineup. Brought to you by Infiniti Parts USA, your OEM source for Q45 parts!
my12by60
Posts: 273
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:32 pm
Location: Fountain Hills, AZ

Post

I replaced my battery a few months ago and starts have been quick and strong. Over the last week or so, I have had a few no starts. I turn the key and all that I hear is a single click. I checked the battery cables and found some corrosion on the positive cable. The cable is a bit unique. The copper line connects to a 90-degree metal bracket. Then the terminal connector bolts to the metal bracket. The corrosion was between terminal connector and the metal bracket. I cleaned that up and had good starts for the next 4 or 5 days. Then yesterday I had a perfect first start. I drove 5 miles to a store and got the no start click on my first attempt. The next starting attempt was successful and sounded normal, no dragging, clicking or other abnormal sounds.

Any ideas of what these symptoms suggest or what to check?

The car has the original starter in it.
Last edited by EdBwoy on Fri Jan 19, 2018 4:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Update with solution


EdBwoy
Moderator
Posts: 3507
Joined: Tue Dec 25, 2012 12:47 am
Location: Indiana, USA
Contact:

Post

Not much except to guess that it requires a little patience once the door is unlocked :gotme
post6707548.html#p6707548

These cars can make a dang good getaway car for a bank robbery - fast yet subdued looks. As long as you leave them running outside the bank!

my12by60
Posts: 273
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:32 pm
Location: Fountain Hills, AZ

Post

Thanks. I am going to grab the spare key and see if that eliminates the no starts. Maybe key slop is the problem and the maybe the spare key has fewer starts under its belt? And I will pay attention to the timing of how soon I try to start the car after entering.

ZiprHead
Posts: 110
Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2017 11:30 am
Car: 1999 Infiniti Q45 base
Location: Saginaw, MI, USA

Post

Have you checked the connection on the starter motor?

User avatar
elwesso
Posts: 34280
Joined: Sun Feb 23, 2003 4:52 pm
Car: 94 Infiniti Q45t 5 spd
2007 BMW M Coupe
2007 Infiniti G35 S 6MT
Location: Indiana
Contact:

Post

If you're hearing a click from the starter, it's possible the starter is going out. You could be hearing the solenoid clicking but the starter could be worn out.

my12by60
Posts: 273
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:32 pm
Location: Fountain Hills, AZ

Post

I did some more work on this a couple of weeks ago. After studying the negative battery cable, I noticed what looked like a bit of corrosive build-up (greenish color) where the negative battery terminal pinch-clamped onto the bare copper of the cable. I used some baking soda and water and a small dental pick to clean that up as best I could without taking the terminal off of the cable. I have had all clean starts since then, so perhaps the ground path was disrupted just enough to create some bad starts. I will keep the board posted if I have a recurrence of the click/no-start symptom. The problem seems to be solved for now, at least.

EdBwoy
Moderator
Posts: 3507
Joined: Tue Dec 25, 2012 12:47 am
Location: Indiana, USA
Contact:

Post

Thanks for the update. This should have crossed my mind to share an update as well.


My dad drives an Infiniti i35. Apparently since summer 2017 he has been having issues with his battery dying when he comes back to the car on the weekends. I recommended he take the battery to Autozone for testing and they said it was fine; so they suggested he disconnect the terminal when he leaves for the week.
That suggestion didn't sit well to me - cars are designed in such a way that they should be able to sit for months and keep going.

Fast forward to the first week of January 2018 after he comes back from vacation. The previous day my brother reconnected the terminal and started the car with no problems, but he didn't think (nor desire I'm guessing) to remove the terminal again. The next day my dad tries the car, it just struggled to crank without turning over. Eventually it trickled down to a click when he turned the ignition.

He calls in the big guns (yours truly :gapteeth: ) and I drive 1 hour to fool around with this thing in 4 degrees F. [Small sacrifice for what the man has done for us as a single father btw, I just wanted to paint the picture].
I try to use my 2 gauge jumper cable that is always a sure-starter but his car doesn't seem to catch quite right. I try with the jumpers on the terminals on the battery as well as grounding to the car itself, but no dice. It just barely gets there, and I assumed the battery was so dead that even straight jumping to the body wasn't going to cut it.
Earlier, while troubleshooting over the phone I had suggested he jams a screwdriver in the terminal to make it tighter since the constant removal and re-installation exerts premature wear. That hadn't worked so I went to walmart and bought 3 terminals on my way over.
The POSITIVE one was in bad shape and I replaced it.
Why the positive you ask? Well, that's the one the guys at Autozone told him to disconnect. :facepalm: Oh well... I don't sell batteries for a living, so they probably know something I don't. I advised him to disconnect the NEGATIVE one if he ever finds himself in that position again.

Back to the story.
I replace the +ve terminal and jump it again. After about 3 tries, it finally turned over and I took it for a highway cruise to let the alternator do its magic to the battery.
Every time we talk I ask him about the car and the handful of times he has started the car, it has done it with no hesitation. First time start, starts like a new car.

The verdict: a bad terminal that we lived with for far too long.

my12by60
Posts: 273
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:32 pm
Location: Fountain Hills, AZ

Post

Good story. I long for the day when I can refer to my self as "the big gun" when it comes to solving car problems.

What do you think was wrong with the positive terminal? How was it attached to the cable? Did you find any corrosion when you took of the original terminal for replacement?

EdBwoy
Moderator
Posts: 3507
Joined: Tue Dec 25, 2012 12:47 am
Location: Indiana, USA
Contact:

Post

Haha. Well, in my family there's no question who is.

The terminal didn't look too bad in color, just the dirty gray of aluminum.
It was connected to the bulky fuse-joint by a 12mm nut and stud/bolt through a crimped terminal with a hole through it. I think the OEM stud was welded to the terminal and the walmart one used a wing nut in place of the 12mm nut. I'll confirm when I get home.

I don't know what caused the initial mis-contact in the first place, but the constant removal had made it noticeably flimsier than the negative one.
Even fully tightened I could still turn it on the battery post.

my12by60
Posts: 273
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:32 pm
Location: Fountain Hills, AZ

Post

Sounds like the i35 uses the same positive cable set-up as the Q. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, my positive cable has quite a bike of caked corrosion that was somewhat hidden where the plate from the terminal covered the attachment plate of the cable. The corrosion was in between the two plates that bolted together. Even after cleaning that corrosion on the positive cable, however, I was still getting some bad starts. Since working on the negative cable I have not had any bad starts, so I am thinking that was the source of the problem.

EdBwoy
Moderator
Posts: 3507
Joined: Tue Dec 25, 2012 12:47 am
Location: Indiana, USA
Contact:

Post

All is well that ends well. I'll update the title for future searches.

EdBwoy
Moderator
Posts: 3507
Joined: Tue Dec 25, 2012 12:47 am
Location: Indiana, USA
Contact:

Post

Which reminds me, for the sake of clarity, to explain why it is recommended to do the negative one.
I recently learned a new term - eli5 (explain like I'm 5).
You guys on the Q forum might not need this lesson, but someone who stumbles upon this in a Google search might benefit from it.


In every Nissan I have dealt with, the battery is set up the same way - top mounted posts whereby the bulky positive wire and terminal has a cap (usually red).

Every other metal component in the engine bay (including the encasing one inch away from the battery) is a negative terminal. If I removed the positive wire and hence the mostly-protective red cap, I am exposing the positive post to the risk of shorting it when a tool touches it and any metal in the engine bay.

Shorting a battery (directly connecting the positive to negative) will spark violently and I've seen it go BOOM!

I called it a mostly-protective cap because any determined daredevil can still short a battery. Secondly, it is very flimsy and will probably break the 3rd time you unfasten it. It doesn't fit well over anything other than an OEM terminal.
In reality the chances of this accident are slim, but like most safety systems, it safeguards us against the 1% times it could happen while providing a sense of security 100% of the time.

User avatar
Q451990
Moderator
Posts: 11473
Joined: Tue Jul 23, 2002 8:21 am
Car: 1990 Q45 - 118K, 2022 Toyota 4 Runner, 2004 Frontier M/T - 108K, 2012 Xterra (Mom's), 2023 Rogue (Inlaws)
Location: Columbia, SC
Contact:

Post

The OEM replacement terminal is cheap... Even cheaper on eBay... I went down this road on my Mom's Xterra. There was a mushroom of corrosion hiding under the red cover. I bought the WalMart wing nut version as a temporary until my next parts order. I like the design vs. the old way where you have to replace the whole cable back to the starter if you want to keep everything factory.

ZiprHead
Posts: 110
Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2017 11:30 am
Car: 1999 Infiniti Q45 base
Location: Saginaw, MI, USA

Post

I was always taught to disconnect the negative first before doing any work.


Return to “Q45 Forum / Cima Forum”