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Old 05-11-2018, 06:44 AM   #1
V
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battery or starter?

So I've been ignoring a warm/hot start issue with my car now but finally need to fix it. Alternator charges fine. Car can sit days and start fine. But if i start it and drive a very short distance, even just a minute, the car cranks slowly and then acts like it has a dead battery. Battery will be around 12.2 volts when it acts up and during cranking, it'll drop to 3.5-4 volts. When i let off the key. Voltage returns to 12. Fires up great when jumpstarted. I've narrowed it down ta bad starter that may be dragging and causing excessive current draw or a battery where the cells are separating under load. Car has had slow cranking since at least October, but never needed a jump like it did twice in the past 2 days. I have a used starter i can put in but im not so sure that's the main issue. Could a failing starter have damaged the battery over the past 6 months? I guess Ill have to battery load tested at an auto parts store and replace if bad(can't find a date on battery- id assume 3 years at most). If original, the starter could have 147k miles on it. The used one i got had 70k on it and look clean.($58). I did clean battery terminals and that did seem to make cold starts even nicer but did not affect warm/ hot starting. So who thinks battery and who thinks starter?
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