Dead Dak - Help please!

From: Stephen Cecil (scecil@npc.net)
Date: Tue Jul 20 2004 - 07:40:44 EDT


Yesterday while driving home, about 100 yards from my house, my Dak (2K 4.7L
Auto) stopped running all of a sudden. When I tried to re-start it, it would
barely turn over. I have a 6-month old Optima battery. Thinking the battery
was low, I got my wife's car and tried to jump it. It only cranked a little
better, and the insulation on the engine ground strap started to melt!

I thought it might be heat soak in the starter(my '69 Camaro w/headers used to
do that all the time), but that's never happened to the Dak before. I got it
towed to the house and tried to start it this morning. It will crank slowly at
first and then faster as it goes, but as soon as it seems to catch, the engine
dies. Also, the ground strap insulation melting thing is still there. No
clanking or unusual mechanical sounds. It hasn't lit up the check engine light.
  I have checked the voltage of the battery (~12.3V resting).

The last time I had something like this happen (in a Impala), the timing gears
were stripped. Luckily I have a motorcycle to ride to work on, but I would like
to see if I can fix this without going to the dealer. I have the FSM but
haven't had the time to run through it yet. Any ideas or suggestions?

I'm in digest mode, but I'll be checking the WWW gateway throughout the day.

Thanks!

Steve
00 CC Sport+ 4.7L Auto 3.55 LSD



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