01 Cherokee sport
Inline 6 4.0 Motor
auto transmission
236K Miles

What’s up Cherokee forum. I am new and this is my first post. Please be respectful. I understand this problem is somewhat common with jeeps. Ive read many forums but not many have came back with the solutions which turns into a wild goose chase. Im listing what I did in order so you can narrow down your problem. Thank you to all who helped me with ideas from other jeep forum posts. I have done extensive research and just went through a journey to get my 01 xj fixed so I’m hoping that this will help people who are having the same or similar problem.

So I am not a mechanic but I am decently mechanically savvy. Fixed many of cars including my best friend’s jeeps and have worked on commercial Ferris Zero turns for 10 years. The gist of it is I can swing some wrenches. My best friend is insanely into jeeps (has 4) eventually convinced me to go ahead and give them a try. Another buddy which I bought the jeep from was having the problems of not starting, dim lights, no click like a dead battery (with new battery) he worked on it for about a month and then decided to give up and scrap it. It DID NOT AND WOULD NOT CRANK SINCE I BOUGHT IT. I told him I would give him $200 and pay towing fees from his house to mine in which he agreed. I got super busy and it sat for almost a year. This weekend I decided to dive in and try to atleast get it to turn over.

DISCONNECT BATTERY BEFORE YOU DO ANY ELECTRICAL WORK!!!!!

1. I tried to jump the battery and cleaning the terminals/ battery posts. Nothing.

2. Purchased a NEW battery slapped it in and instead of nothing, it started making the rapid click noise like the battery is dead. I had lights inside and out plus the dash was lit up but everything was somewhat dim and flickering.

3. Used multi meter on the battery first (while vehicle key in on position) and it read about 12.5v so that’s good. Next the alternator which was running about 14.1-3v which is perfect. Then I tried it on the solenoid on the starter and the volts fluctuated between 5v-11v. I assumed that possibly the solenoid was bad but I also questioned the terminal cables.

4. Checked and smeared die electrical grease on every fuse under the hood and under passenger dash and of course all were good Took off every cable from battery, solenoid, alternator, firewall, and block. Used penetrating oil on all terminals and wire brushed until clean of everything. Dowsed terminal spray on every contact plus I made sure every bolt was tight. No luck still rapid click no turn.

5. Took apart my steering column after a forum led me to believe the ignition switch. At auto parts store I bought ignition switch ($40) ASD relay and starter relay ($35) and a ground strap ($5-$10) which is a metal braided wire that connects to your firewall and to the top backside of your block. You will need a security torque bit (torque bit with hole on top) to remove the ignition switch. If you are careful and have a small enough drill bit you can pop out the nipple in middle the of screw but I DO NOT RECOMMEND because you can strip the head of screw. Be careful not to break your actuator pin under ignition switch when installing. I put all of those in and still rapid click no turn.

6. The next day I woke up ready for battle went straight to auto parts store. I purchased a new Starter motor with solenoid ($200 or $160 with core charge) + and - battery cables with terminals on them and thicker gauge than oem ($30-$40) an extra negative cable both ends being flat with bolt hole ($10) I disconnected all wires from battery and starter solenoid. If you are looking down at your engine bay the left side of motor between motor and coolant reservoir is where the starter is located ( follow positive terminal from battery). It is easier to access and work from under jeep by passenger tire. Two bolts hold it in and ta-da you have rust in your eyes and a black eye from it falling on your face.

7. Put the new starter in and ran the new positive cable to solenoid. The control cable (smallest wire) was looking shabby and beat up so cut old end off, put a donut connector on the wire, crimped it tight and put the screw through the donut to the solenoid nice and snug. I ran the new negative cable from negative terminal to the left side of engine right by alternator with one of the two alternator wires. I noticed on the old negative cable from earlier there was another wire that split from the negative terminal someone had cut. I bought the extra negative cable with this in mind. I took a dremel wire wheel and ground a spot to metal about the size of the connector end on the inside of the hood on the quarter panel. Carefully bent the connector in a 90 degree angle and used a self tapping screw and washer to secure it. So now the negative terminal on the battery is grounded in two places on quarter panel and side of block. Put terminals on battery sprayed every contact again with the terminal juice. I turned the key and it fired right up with no sputtering or hesitation.

My conclusion is that I believe the negative battery cable was my problem. If you are getting a rapid click it is because you are not grounded good enough. You are drawing a huge power loss hence the reason it wouldn’t turn over and why the solenoid was fluctuating voltage the way it was. It may have been the starter for all I know but I will say check all the easy cheaper stuff like ground wires and contact points before going gung ho on more expensive items.

Thank you for the help you guys are awesome! I love the jeep forums and the community. I hope something I have said helps you. I spent two days straight wrenching on this thing and didn’t think it was in my caliber to bring this thing back from the dead. Don’t give up! Any questions you have for me I will gladly answer ASAP. Have a good day and I’ll see you on the trails 😁🤙

 

tl;dr

 

Oddly I'm in a very similar situation. Not a mechanic, but do like tinkering and probably better set up to troubleshoot this stuff than your average person off the street. Bought my jeep as a project about a year ago but certainly not a daily driver. A couple weeks ago a 7 pound steel plate was kicked up onto the hood of my daily driver on my commute and caused $5k in damage. While I worked that out with Geico I started driving the Jeep to work. As luck would have it, the day I picked up my rental car the Jeep stopped starting. I too, thought it might be the ignition. In my case, I took the ignition a part and just tried hot wiring it. I believe I hot-wired it correctly, but had the same result as turning the key (single click, no start, all other power inside the car seemed fine).

At that point I whipped out the multimeter. After testing a bunch of stuff I think there were a few important tests that anyone with this problem should run:

1. Test voltage to the power side of the solenoid (12.4+ in my case).
2. Test voltage to the control wire with the key in the start position (12.4+ in my case)
3. Test resistance between battery ground and the case of the starter (turned out inconsistent at best for me)

With the ground situation not looking great, I could probably have considered the problem to be diagnosed at that point. To be certain I didn't have a bad starter though, I ran a jumper cable from battery negative to the starter case (skipped the solenoid) because it was just easier to get to the case. Turned the key to start and it fired right up. I then removed the jumper cable and was able to drive it about 3 feet up the driveway before it stalled. I'm guessing the stall was also ground related (fuel pump or whatever). That was Sunday night so I threw in the towel for the weekend. My position is that anything that's worth doing is worth overdoing so I ordered the big 7 upgrade in 2ga from JeepCables: https://jeepcables.com/xj-big-7-comp...herokee-87-01/

Hopefully that will be here this weekend and I'll be able to slap that upgrade on and get it back on the road.