Starter motor just died. No warning

[mjr350]

Yasterday morning the GU tried to start like it had a low battery and I ended up roll starting. A quick drive to work and I thought she'll be charged enough but I was wrong. Completely dead, not even a click.
BUT
Everything else worked fine. Windows didn't seem to have any loss of power at all so it had me stumped and another roll start was on the cards to get home.

Long story short, it was the starter motor. I had a mate hold the key on while I attacked it with a hammer and it made a slight murmor but nothing else.
Luckily my mate had a spare and we're all good.

My question is does a starter motor usually just die or does it give warning over a few weeks.
Also will a deep water crossing contribute?

[happygu]

They can fail gradually or instantly ..... there is no real pattern that I can discern.

I have been through lots of water crossings and never had a starter fail, so I would discount that in clean water, but in saying that, once the contact pads start to corrode, from any impurity, salt or muck, it is the beginning of the end fairly quickly

[NP99]

It's electrical......gremlin dependent :)

[mjr350]

Thanks guys. I'll get my auto electrician to give it a once over.
What does concern me is it was already an after market unit and the starter loom coming from the car had no plug on it, just a blue female spade crimp that pluged into the grey connector on the starter?? The patrol has 140k on it, whats the average life of a nissan starter motor?
The starter in my LS1 commodore ute is well over 270k and just starting to show signs of wear.

[mudnut]

It's hard to say what the expected life of a starter motor is. The vehicle might be started 10 times a day, every day of the year. Someone may have swapped it to test another vehicle. Who knows what has happened before you bought it.

[alltorque]

It's 50/50 really, sometimes the starter will just crap it and somtimes you can nurse it for awhile. If you are able to nurse the starter, not always but more than likely it'll be something else causing the problem. Check all your terminal connections, wires and earths etc. from ignition through to starter. A starter needs quite a bit of juice to crank so a multi meter and a test light might trouble shoot the issue if your lucky.

[jff45]

The brushes in mine (TB45E) were gone at 120k. It was 6 years old when I bought it and I have no idea how it was used prior to that.
It was suddenly turning over like a flat battery but it started and I got it home. Left it overnight, it wouldn't start next day.
Brushes were completely worn and it was full of the dust from them.
I soldered in new brushes, cleaned it up and put it back in. That was about 5 years ago and it's been good since but I don't use it a lot.
Cost me $25 for The brushes.

[mjr350]

Im thinking thats the issue with mine. Same symptoms

[jff45]

I took pics of mine when I opened it. If I can find them, I'll post them tomorrow..