Thread: 350 Starter issue

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I bought a 95 Jeep Wrangler unfinished project about 6 months ago. Rebuilt 350 engine (about 6,000 on it) with a 350 tranny. 14" 168 tooth flexplate. Got it finished and it ran and drove great.

Starter started grinding and this past weekend wouldn't engage at all. pulled it out and the teeth on the starter are chewed up. The flexplate is decent, some marks on the teeth but none destroyed. Went to O'reilly and matched it up, went to install it and that's when I noticed that the starter teeth only engaged about half way into the teeth on the flexplate. Took it back and we went through their starter assortment to see if we could find a different one with no luck.

Ordered a mini starter from Summit for 168 tooth and it barely engages at all. I'm stumped - anyone have any ideas or recommendations?

Old starter
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New - seems like a big gap.
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Are those the original starter bolts? GM starter bolts are "special.

I have both the original and the ones that came with the new starter. Knurled just after the threads.

I've always wondered about the knurling on those bolts. It's an additional manufacturing expense so they must have a purpose.

Could your flexpate be installed backwards?

It's been running that way for a while. Will it run with it installed backwards?

Originally Posted by firebird77clone

I've always wondered about the knurling on those bolts. It's an additional manufacturing expense so they must have a purpose.

Could your flexpate be installed backwards?

I thought that the holes on the crank flange and flex plate were not evenly spaced, so it only went on one way, but that may just be Fords?

I'd say that the PO installed the wrong flexplate on your engine. I went out to the barn, dug out the starter for my ZZ4 project and bolted it on, just to compare. No shims, no measuring, just held it up and put in the bolts. It's 22F with no heat in the barn, holding a starter that was probably more like 15F and the engine & tranny are in the '32, waiting for attention. Here's a picture, and you can see that the end of the starter gear is almost at the forward edge of the flexplate. I did measure the travel of the bendix, and it was exactly 1/2" which would yield full engagement, plus a hair, with the flexplate. And before someone jumps me, the tranny is bolted on without the converter, just for getting the engine & tranny set, and body mods done.

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flexplates are often put on reversed and cause this issue------bolt pattern is even on Chev but does have dowel pin hole altho most don't have the pin in the crank. If reversed you can usually tell from looking at where the converter bolts to plate-the flat spots that go against the bolt bosses on the converter will be wrong-

Yeah, I bet that's it. It's a good thing I got it cheap. LOL

Firebird and Jerry are right - I was thinking of my SBF with the odd spaced holes. Having the flex plate reversed also pushes the converter back and can lead to early failure of your tranny, too. Picture of the SBC flex plate, showing the dowel pin hole that Jerry mentioned.

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Ok, I tried 4 different starters and finally found one that would engage the flywheel half way. I finally ended up at Autozone and one of their parts guys is retired from a company that rebuilt starters and alternators. He said that the QC on the starters is crap and often times, the mounting points are leveled etc. He told me to take one, try it, bring it back if it didn't fit and try another.

A couple of starters later, a half shim and it's nice and quiet.

Keep an eye on it, the teeth are bound to wear down with it engaging only half way.

Not half deep into the teeth, halfway across the flexplate. Instructions say 1/2 to 3/4 across.

Originally Posted by Kafn8td

Not half deep into the teeth, halfway across the flexplate. Instructions say 1/2 to 3/4 across.

You really ought to drop the tranny and flip your flex plate around to get full engagement, unless you verified that it's right. I know it's a pain, but that's the right way to do it, especially considering that the reversed flex plate pushes your converter back too far, and may cause your tranny to fail way early. I saw one post that said they lost the front pump at 10,000 miles.