My 98 won't start; need some advice

Good day all,

I went to start my car this morning and got a single click, not a constant set of clicks, from the solenoid. Nothing in the engine compartment happened other than the click. The trunk pops just fine, my lights look good, and all the sounds are loud and proud. I hooked up my wife's 4Runner to jump my car, and the same result; a single click, not a chattering. I even have 12.4 Volts on the battery.

I am almost ready to go out and buy a new starter solenoid, based on the fact that all the other battery tell-tales seem to be okay.

I just wanted to know what you guys think, being most of you are probably a little more car savy than I am. If this was a plane, I would be in there, but . . .

Thanks for the advice, I do appreciate it.

Well, if you could see my face turning about a million different shades of red right now. . . .

The car starts up just fine. I guess I just wasn't meant to drive the car earlier. Who knows.

Anyway, thanks for reading.

Hey Michael,

The battery is still the original from when I bought the car just under two years ago. I have put about 12,000 miles on it, in that time.

I did check what I could see without removing parts before, and everything visually checked good. I guess I could still put a meter to the car when it is running and check some things.

My concern is what you stated, that my starter is going. However, I am not used to hearing that single click like I did. It has been my experience to hear a chattering, or the car try to start. Today, I only got one single click. That was a bit odd. The starter never turned, so, the engine never turned, which is why I was putting up the solenoid as suspect number one.

Do you have any other advice for me on this? I sure would appreciate it.

Thanks to all of you guys for the inputs. I do appreciate it.

I will try the ground test as soon as I can. The car has been 100% since I posted this thread, so the "worry" factor is starting to go down, but that is usually when you get bitten in the "you know what."

Thanks again.