Replaced my starter back in July. Not even 6 months later, Im having some issues. I got back to my car and tried to start and got no crank. Popped the hood and found a lot of corrision on the terminals. Tapped on the battery terminals and on the starter and got the car to start. On my first stop, I turned off and when I tried to crank I heard a spinning noise. Turned off and still have a spinning noise. I popped the hood and tapped the starter and the noise went away. I pulled the hot lead and put back on and the starter worked fine. Got home and starter worked fine for multiple crank times. Came back out and drove to work. After I tried to start again, (away from home) I'm having the same issue. I'm going to guess that I need a new starter but just wanted to see if someone had the same problem.

 

Try rebuilding the unit? If not the Autozone duralast has been working fine in my TL for almost 2 years now.. I already rebuild the OEM Starter just in case, Its pretty easy.

 

more info on rebuilding please? I want to rebuild mine before it goes out, im at 105k miles which seems to be around when they begin to fail. I've had the one click-no start a few times in the last few months. Same happened with my last two TLs.

 

Well I guess I said 2 little 2 late. I think the solenoid was getting stuck in place and caused the starter to over heat. On my journey home from work, I got the starter going by again having to hit the starter to get the gear to stop spinning. Finally got the car to start and started to make the journey home. I got about a mile down the street and the radio started flickering. Got another quarter mile and my gauges all went out. Immediately afterwards the car dies and smoke starts coming out of the engine. I push the car into a spot and proceeded to walk the rest of the way home. I can only imagine what kind of damage has been done now Here's a little more information. I bought the starter from Oreillys back in June. I still have the receipt but there is no brand. It says something about Quality but that's the only thing on the pamplet about a brand. Oreilly said that would replace it.

 

Epilogue - Luckily this just turned out to be a bad solenoid in the starter. I went and warrantied the 6 month old starter. The plastic piece melted pretty bad but after installing the new starter, it seems like that was the only issue. Moral of the story: If you're starter starts to sound like a drill and goes away with tapping, replace starter or at least pull out to check solenoid to avoid any unwanted break downs. Thanks for the replies!