Voltage drop at starter.

[2ringers]

1984 Honda 200ES. Been in the family since new.

When trying to start, it will barely try to crank. Sounds like a dead battry. With the compression release engaged, it will barely crank enough to trip the release, then nothing.

Voltage drops to 6.7 volts at the starter, solenoid and battery. New battery, load tested as good. With the wire removed from the starter, there is no voltage drop. I removed the wire from the starter and solenoid and checked it with an ohmmeter and no abnormal resistance. Cleaned the connections and hooked it back up. Removed the ground wire at both ends, cleaned connections and checked with ohmmeter. Removed wire from battery to solenoid and cleaned the connections and checked the wire with ohmmeter. I made a new wire for between the solenoid and battery anyway, but no difference. I tried using a jump pack, no difference. I hooked a second battery in parallel with the new battery, no difference. In bought a new starter, no difference.

With the starter removed, it will spin and there is no voltage drop. When the starter is installed again, voltage drop and barely tries to crank.

I tried jumping the solenoid. Same result.
I unhooked the wire to the starter and jumped directly from the battery. Same thing.

It will start with the pull starter.

What am I missing?

[350for350]

The electric starter probably needs to be rebuilt or replaced. When the starter is removed from the engine, it will be easier to make it turn over with power since it's only turning itself and no part of the engine.

[shortline10]

It’s either the starter , battery or a battery terminal issue, check both + and - connections .
The ground wire from the battery to the chassis needs a real good connection .

[ATC King]

New starter or new to you (used)?


How well is the starter body grounded? The front should be considered isolated because of the O-ring. The rear of the starter body, and the mounting bracket it all bolts to should be clean, bare metal (no paint, metallic coatings OK). At least the starter case and bracket anyway.The bolts going into the case will do the rest, paint on the side cover where the bracket bolts is fine.

If wanting to test the condition of a cable, you can voltage drop test it with a simple voltmeter. Live positive or negative cable, it doesn't matter as long as it's loaded to operational conditions.

Both voltmeter leads go on the same wire. For instance, testing the ground cable, put one lead on the cable at the battery and the other lead on the cable where it bolts to the frame or engine. Engage the starter and record the voltage on the meter, you'll see the difference, how much voltage you're loosing from one end to the other. It works the same on positive cables.

There are easy to find voltage drop charts online, based on cable material (copper, aluminum, tinned copper, copper coated aluminum, etc.), gauge, and length.

No need to remove a cable or mess with anything else, just hook up the voltmeter, record, and research. Resistance tests on larger cables is unreliable, this is the much better method, faster, and requires less work.

[2ringers]

Brand new starter. Issue is the same with the old starter and the new one.
Ground connections have been thoroughly cleaned.
I think I can rule out all of the positive wires as I have taken a jumper wire from a battery positive to the starter terminal with the same results.
The only thing I have not done is tried a ground wire to the starter.

[2ringers]

Voltage drop from negative battery terminal to ground point is 0.17 volts.
Voltage drop from positive battery terminal to starter terminal is 0.8 volts.
Voltage reading from ground to starter terminal when cranking with starter installed is 6.7 volts.
Voltage reading from ground to starter terminal when cranking with starter removed is 12.7 volts.

[ps2fixer]

Sounds like a weak battery. Could use a set of jumper cables to a car battery and try to jump start the machine to confirm a larger capacity battery helping solves the problem.

In the first post it was said that the battery load tested good, what was the process for that? The ATV starters should only draw around 100 amp, unlike a car starter that can spike to 400+ amps before it drops down. The typical load tester is designed for car batteries and is a 10 second load at 100 amps with a fully charged battery, and the voltage it's at while under load after that amount of time gives a rough indication of it's CCA capacity.

You'll never see a voltage drop with zero load, even through a very bad connection or even if you put a resistor in line. It's when there's power flow when voltages drop due to resistance.

I'm wondering if too small of a battery was installed or something, I think they call for something like a 12ah (small batteries aren't normally rated in CCA), the wrong type of battery could be possible too, like a AGM style battery I'm pretty sure tends to have a lower peak output.

One other thing that hasn't been mentioned that I've seen, how hard is it to pull the engine over by hand? If it's hard to turn over, it would work the starter harder, draw more power, and could end up effectively at the same situation. I'm pretty sure those have a one way bearing for the starter, if that's going, it's possible it could slip and not turn the engine over as fast, but the starter load would be less in that case.

To add a little context, my F250 with brand new interstate batteries (7.3L diesel), while cranking with glow plugs running it drops to around 9.5v. It's a very heavy draw on the batteries though, glow plugs alone are 200 amps, starter is probably another 300-400 amps after the initial spike. I'm sure the battery cables are less than perfect connection, so the voltage at the batteries are probably a fair bit higher, that's something I was planning to fix/upgrade on it.

[ATC King]

The positive cable needs replaced, but you've bypassed that and it still wasn't the problem.

Replacing both cables would be best.

Beyond that, try jumping the starter by itself with the jumper ground connected to the starter bracket and directly feeding it from the jumper to the positive starter post. You can leave the key off if just wanting to see if it turns over faster.

If you still have the problem it's either the starter or something in the mechanism under the cover.

I understand it's a new starter, but N.E.W. can mean Never Even Worked. Also, if for some reason the mech is dragging and you've been poking the starter a bit too long, that wasn't exactly good for it. Same as extended cranking or low voltage can damage a starter.

If you directly actuate the starter and it's still an issue, may as well pull the cover and have a look. Starter mech issues aren't common on the 200ES, but if it's ever kicked back while starting something may have been damaged. I'd have to look if the 200ES mech has any anti-kickback capability, but I don't think it does. What happens, and I've seen it on other machines with electric start but without anti-kickback, if the engine kicks back the force isn't relieved in a controlled manner so it starts breaking parts, typically on the case bosses where the rotating assemblies are held.

It's not some wild event, just a pop and crack.

[ATC King]

Since the OP posted the voltage loss values, I'd like to point some things out, not necessarily about the current issue but for anyone reading the thread in the future.

The OPs loss of 0.17 on the ground and 0.80 on the positive is a volt of loss at the starter. Battery voltage drops during starting and it's not unrealistic for it to be near 10 volts. Subtract another volt and it's at 9 to the starter. With everything working as it should and not being in extreme temperature, it may start okay. In cold temps, with thicker oil, probably not.

The 200ES doesn't have any type of auto-decompression mechanism, like many modern engine do. The 200ES battery is larger to compensate. Looking at most modern engines of a similar displacement, they use smaller batteries because they have an auto-decomp, which allows the engine to spin more freely before starting.

For an extreme comparison, modern 18 wheelers use a 12v system, but they have 4-5 large capacity batteries and cables with a larger gauge than anyone will see outside of commercial equipment use. The batteries alone weigh hundreds of pounds. In the winter, block heaters are still needed for them to start if they sit unused overnight.

The 200ES has a starter clutch, but it's an assembly, unlike modern small engines that basically use a one way bearing as the starter clutch. More weight and complexity on the 200ES starter clutch. It also doesn't have a torque limiting device that prevents damage to the starting mechanism if something kicks back, even during engine shut down.

The electric starting system on a 200ES seldom has issues, but these things are 40 years old now. The starters lack factory lubrication, the brushes are worn, and they're just dirty inside by this point. I've been able to disassemble, clean, lubricate, and reinstall old, non working starters on a 200ES, but it's just a bandage. They may work for years, or maybe less.

Replacing the cables and using a good battery will extend the life of the starter on an old trike, but once the system has issues, it's time to rebuild the whole thing if it's to be reliable. A new battery, cables, and starter.

The recoil starter on a 200ES is just meant for backup, it's not as robust as the other trikes that only have a recoil. If the recoil is relied upon to start, it won't last and parts are getting harder to come by. Spend the money and fix the electric start, or run the trike into the ground and junk it. These old trikes take some money to keep going now.


To the OP, I'd check engine compression. A worn engine may not start with the electric start but may still with the recoil.