04 Pontiac Grand Am Issues

[jpsantell]

My daughters 2004 grand am with a 3,4L engine has developed what I think are very bad symptoms. The car would not start and seemed to crank funny. You turn the key and get two revolutions and then a clicking from the starter. I thought maybe the battery but had it tested at two different places and it's fine Pulled the starter and ended up replacing it but still only getting two revolutions and a clicking from the starter. This car is not cranking away , just two revs. Finally I got the thing started and have black smoke coming out the exhaust and an occasional missfire. The black smoke and difficulty cranking sound like the engine may have partially seized, am I right? Or, could there be some other reason for this strange behavior?

[[ChaosweaveR]]

Yikes.

What's the mileage on the motor? Is the SES light on?

[Azrael]

Check for the dreaded "milkshake" under the oil and coolant caps.

[jpsantell]

No check engine light and oil and coolant look normal.

[86FieroSEv6]

Well, let's see which way to go here. Get a voltmeter, put it across the battery terminals. Have somebody attempt to start the car. If we see very little voltage loss, then we need to check the battery cable connections, especially the grounds. If we see the voltage drop quite a bit, then we need to disable the fuel supply to stop the engine from trying to create work and see whether cranking improves. Based on your description, it sounds like an electrical problem.

[jpsantell]

When I get home from work today I'll check for the voltage drop. I cleaned the connections up pretty well with sandpaper when I replaced the starter so if the connection is bad it probably would be the cables themselves. I didn't clean the big battery ground on the block though, it was kind of hard to get at.

[[ChaosweaveR]]

Worse case, it could need new battery/starter cables.

You didn't tell us the mileage, it could be in need of a tune up. Plugs and wires certainly help.

[jpsantell]

The car has 85 k miles but I have already changed the plugs,wires, fuel filter, throttle sensor and crank sensor. I started the car and got a drop in voltage from 12.5 to 11 v.

[86FieroSEv6]

That doesn't seem too bad, normally I see the volts go down to about 10. Check the ground cable connection to the engine.

[[ChaosweaveR]]

That seems alright, if it was lower than 9 volts, then there would be a electrical issue to go after.

[CNCguy]

How heavy is the black smoke? Sounds rich. Could one cylinder be hydro locking from fuel or coolant and causing the engine to stop cranking after two revolutions?

[[ChaosweaveR]]

How heavy is the black smoke? Sounds rich. Could one cylinder be hydro locking from fuel or coolant and causing the engine to stop cranking after two revolutions?

The OP said the oil looked clean.

[Azrael]

To check for hydrolock, pull the sparkplugs and see if they're wet with anything.

[jpsantell]

I'll tackle the car again tomorrow, it's late and getting colder out. Supposed to be 6o tomorrow.