[Bob Carriere]

Couple of questions and observations about the starter.

1. Does yours have the return spring on the linkage that pulls it all the way back when disengaged? Without this spring the starter drive can slide back and hit the ring gear.I installed an avaialble soft throttle spring and it seems to be holding the handle back out of the way.
2. Is the lever hitting anything when the starter is fully engaged? There should be a half to a full inch of travel in the lever once everything is engaged. There is spring on the start drive which allows for over travel and to be sure that the switch has over travel to insure full engagement. With out the over travel you can end up with the switch or drive not engaging fully.Seems most of the problem was in the bent starter backet and the handle...once straightened out they were fine....
3. Watch out for some of the aftermarket switches which do not have over travel spring, in which case the adjustment of the linkage becomes very important.We rebuild an old starter and that one worked but seemed to draw current like an old toaster.........actually the saem switch was used/swapped between the toaster and the good one
4. Dose your starter have a thrust washer at the flywheel end?The old toaster one did not the replacement he installed back in place at the end of Sunday di have the washers.... on a positive note....Rob can now remove and reinstall a starter inless than 30 minutes and that includes swapping the switch.........
5. How many teeth does your starter have 9 or 10 and is this a match for your flywheel?....Never did count the little suckers.... next time it breaksd own and Rob removes it we will count them.... probably in the next two weeks....



Reason I'm asking all of these questions as I have just had to pull the starter out of Beauty, 261 engine with 216 flywheel and ring gear. Reason the starter drive first started making funny noises, and spinning without engaging immediately. Then spinning and not engaging. I'm using the original 6 volt 216 starter which worked fine until recently. From the sounds and poor speed spinning the engine I had suspected that starter was at fault. Beauty is set up with a battery selector switch so I can give the starter 6 volt or 12 volts from the radio battery. With the floor up and the brush band off I could see that the starter was turning but the engine wasn't.

When I removed it and removed the drive unit I discovered that the drive unit, original to the truck 63 years old, which is a one way over ride clutch would no longer lock up completely. New drive ordered. Only difficulty with finding a new one was being sure that it was a 9 tooth to match the original.Phil we have a bunch of old starters.... if you can't find one let us know... we can ship from UPS cheap in upper NY.

If you need pictures of the starter and linkage on another late 45 HUP let me know and I'll take up the floor plate on mine and take pictures.