occasional grinding noise when starting (does not start when this happens)

[guest3984]

Hi all,

I have a 1.4 I-DSI Sport Manual from 2007. I've had it for a few weeks, bought it used with 75000 miles on the clock. Runs perfectly apart from a very occasional startup issue where the car fails to start.

Very occasionally (probably about one time in ten attempts) at startup, the car will fail to start. When the key is turned in the ignition, I will hear what sounds like two plates or discs scraping off eachother at speed and this will continue as long as i hold the key in that position. When trying this i will either be in first gear with clutch depressed, or neutral.

When this happens you can't hear the normal 'chugging' of the engine attempting to start, just the grinding noise as above.

I can normally get the car to start when this happens by messing around with the clutch and gears, for example, trying starting in neutral instead of first (or vice versa), or depressing and bringing the clutch pedal back up a few times in case anything has 'stuck'.

The car is clean as a whistle to drive once it gets going, this problem is only at startup. The clutch feels healthy, the gearbox is smooth and I get about 38 mpg on short city runs.

Only other related thing I can think of that might have something to do with it - occasionally when I start the engine, tickover is around about 1500RPM until I get the car moving, then it settles down to 500RPM if i'm sat at the lights at the top of my street, for example. This also happens sometimes when I put the car into reverse. For all I know this could be perfectly normal, and just me being a numpty.

Sorry for the nontechnical language! I'm still learning about cars! and fingers crossed this won't be too expensive to sort out!

Thank you   

[dg]

cannot help with this but your story reminds me of grinding noise I hear that when  trying to start running engine it's so quite inside that I sometimes forget it's already started wonder why honda allows to start running engine (or to switch into reverse from 5th w/o any safety lock)

warmup form 1500 rpm down to 500rpm is fine,  that how it should be, might be around 700 if aircon pump is running

[guest3858]

Start moter is dying  check the star most probably need's rebuilding or replace sorry

[chrisc]

Batman is correct. The small pinion has stripped most of its gears and/or the return spring is broken.  Replace it before it damages the flywheel

[Twin_Cam_Turbo]

Flywheel could already be damaged.
Replace the starter motor with a good second hand one from a scrappy. Then if it continues to make the noise,  remove the spark plugs, remove the starter and use a USB camera on a flexible neck to peer into the aperture left by the starter. You should see the flywheel ring gear. Get a friend to turn the engine over by hand (this is why you removed the plus) and watch for missing teeth. If you see any then there's your answer - replacement flywheel.

Our fiesta did it. Missing 5 teeth in a row on the flywheel ring gear.

[guest3984]

Thanks for your responses everyone, 

I took it to my mechanic and he said he could find nothing wrong with the starter motor or anything associated with it. However, he did find that the battery held almost none of its charge and desperately needed replaced. Since getting the new battery in I've had no problems with the car at all and it starts a lot more confidently! 

I will however keep an eye on the flywheel etc.. there still could be a problem with it.. who knows!

cheers!