Sounds like a possible very bad connection at the ground side of the
battery, that is a lot of resistance to start melting a ground cable. Clean
those connections well and try it again.
Rascal
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-dakota-truck@bent.twistedbits.net
[mailto:owner-dakota-truck@bent.twistedbits.net] On Behalf Of Stephen Cecil
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 7:41 AM
To: Dakota List
Subject: DML: Dead Dak - Help please!
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
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Aug 01 2004 - 00:46:15 EDT