TrailerTrash

New guy here. Bought my 98 Cherokee 4.0/5 speed not long ago and have been fixing little issues here and there.

this might get long but i want to include all the details. hopefully this is just a starter problem.

Never had a starting issue till yesturday. I drive the thing on a regular basis. yesterday I pulled it in the garage and hooked up my CB radio. grounded it under the glovebox and tapped into the radio power so it would come on with the ignition. wire has a fuse on it. I say this because its the only thing I did to the jeep between starting fine and the not starting issue. after hooking up the CB i had to run the antenna cable and mount the CB so the interior lights were on for awhile and when I went to start it after finishing the install, it wouldnt start. just a click and if i hold the key it would click alot irregularly... if that makes sense. So i assumed the battery was dead. got up early this morning hooked up the charger and let it on for about 6 hours. battery showed 100% on the charger. still just the same clicks.

so I cleaned the battery posts
replaced the terminals with new ones
snipped the ground and power cables down to clean wire
put a new ground on from the batt to inner fender beside the batt

went down to the starter
unhooked the connections
cleaned them
dropped the starter which is a Chrysler/mistubishi and could be original judging by the crud buildup

...and found this. There is nothing for it to rub against other than the flywheel and i see no evidence on such contact. while the entire starter was oil covered, these gouge marks were not. starter bolts were both tight and there was no movement when I gave it a few taps with a rubber mallet.

I am just wondering what you guys think of this and I am hoping the no cranking problem is the starter. I havent tried it since cleaning everything so that could also be the problem. I have a few good batteries to try aswell

TrailerTrash

Put the starter back in and it fired right up. I tried it about a dozen times and it started every time.

then i heard a slight tapping sound coming from the starter area. not constant. just here and there and not very loud. i pulled the started again but couldnt tell if it was hitting or not.

I thought maybe the flywheel is loose so i tried prying on it through the starter hole but couldnt get any movement at all. i marked the flywheel for a starting point and turned it over completely looking for any broken teeth or really anything at all. nothing.

so i cleaned the gouged away area on the starter and colored it in with a sharpie(should have done it the first time) put it back on and found a little wiggle room or "play" before the bolts are tightened down. so i pulled it away from the flywheel and tightened it down. started it and no tapping sounds. loosened it again and just tightened it down and let it seat itself. then i heard tapping when started.

pulled it and saw this(red circles)

TrailerTrash

I also noticed that the upper start bolt is not original. much cleaner and newer than the bottom bolt. maybe the upper bolt fell out and the starter got chewed up?

my only other guess is either its not the correct starter/its an automatic starter. I have no idea if the autos and standards share starters or not just a guess.

obviously I am not going to drive it like this. I am getting a new starter this week. hopefully it works

this is the tag on mine