17.5 Intek Head scratcher!!

[Michael72]

Results are in :biggrin:

I had tried a second battery that was a relatively new and had the same complaints and thats when the scratchin started!!....so I done a load test as advised by SeniorCitizen and both batts failed!!! The new ish batt I had was a dud.... lesson learned and thanks for replys and SeniorCitizen.

 

[bertsmobile1]

You did load yes them after they had been recherged didn't you ?
Common play by dishonest battery merchants is to stick some ones 1/2 charged battery on the carbon pile.
"see the machine says its bad, got agreat deals on these,,," .
When you did your voltage drop at the solenoid, did you have the starter disconnected ?

Next check all of the wires for corosion & tightness.
As you are in Ireland that has the opposite plroble to us down here ( way too much water ) good chance that the wires have corrosion inside the terminals causing a big power loss and don't forget the earth.
Try using a pair of good jumper leads hooked directly the the engine .
Neg to the oil drain then the pos in a couple of spots ( solenoid input terminal , solenoid output terminal , sarter terminal ) and note any major differences.

 

[Tinkerer200]

" If I jump the mower it will fire up and will continue do so while in use....but leave for an hour or so it wont....also I checked battery when running and its at 13.3 ish so charging i guess...if I cross terminals on solenoid it still wont turn starter enough."

Charging OK. Your symptoms suggest bad connection OR cable. I would use a good set of jumper cables and just use one side of it at a time to jump directly to the engine with ground, then to starter with positive. While you may have 12V at the starter solinoid, cable/connection may not be capable of carrying enough amperage.

I once had a similar problem, turned out the positive battery had been spliced under the mower out of sight and the spliced connection was failing leaving an intermittent starting condition.

Walt Conner

 

[Michael72]

I made the mistake of not checking batt under load and also the second batt that was new.....second "new ish" batt was a dud and thats whats threw me off....both only gave me a reading of 4/5v under load, major fail .....silly mistake as all wiring was fine and when i jumped and ran mower for 5min or so it would would start from key until batt died again...V increased when mower was running so no charging issues... Duh