There ya go.

 

The toughone reman. is from worldwide (a Remy Comp). The toughone new is a remy. the driveworks is the cheap crap. I have no clue why they switched to the new toughone name and got rid of the names people recognize. I guess they want to have a name like Autozone's duralast.

Just so you know to for the future. You can buy stuff online at Advance and get the current discount. For example that new starter today would be $139.50 after the 20% off and you get a coupon for $25 off your next purchase and you can pick it up at your local store. The rockauto ACDelco is $132.79.

 

While waiting for things to get here, I went ahead and starter to look around at the wiring of this whole starter issue.

In hopes of being proactive last night I looked at the starting system electical chart and with a little research i decided to check as many electical connectors as I could.

With the help of my dremel, some electical connector cleaning spray and a little elbo grease, I took apart and cleaned the battery connectors, the junction box cables, possitive and ground , the ground to the alternator and to the chassis, as well as the fuses and relays in the fuse box. I even sprayed some cleaner in the ignition. Some of the connections had some corrosion others looked ok. But it doesn't take much to lose enough power to have issues.

This also brought up a question. i really wanted to remove the wiring to the starter and the solenoid but I dont' see how I can get that off without removing the starter first and them manipulating it in such a way to have better access to those nuts. Is that right, for my 02 tahoe, do i need to remove the starter before I can get the wires off??

In the end after putting everything back together, the truck started right up. I'm not holding my breath, but stranger things have happened if this little cleaning session ends up correcting this issue.

 

Thats interesting, I would keep that starter on hand but hey maybe it will work. I have seen stranger things.

 

I was thinking that. In the future, even if it works intermittently it might buy me a few days of driving until I can get the failed one replaced.

I don't know why but my gut feeling on this whole issue is that it's electrical. You know what I mean by that gut feeling? You go through the issue in your head, what was going on when it happened, the condition under which it happened, what you heard, what you've already done in the trouble shooting sequence, the elimination process etc... etc... and it's a feeling i can't shake.

 

It happens, sometimes you have to go with your instinct or it will bug the hell out of you.

 

I have a local shop that rebuilds starters and alternators. Maybe you have one local too.

 

The local rebuilders are the way to go. If you trust them! IMO