Battery and Starter tested and good according to Autozone but no start

[1996BLKBauer]

No. It did not start after jumping it. Samething happened. No change at all.

And its a 4.0 EFI not SOHC so not a timing chain.

I wonder if the starter is not engaging while under load like pitbulldell said.

How could I tell if its seized?

I am uncertain on the Explorers, but don't some vehicles need to have the starts shimmed. Also, not enough power getting to the starter would make it not turn.

In my class we rebuilt a starter, and it didn't work, the pole shoes would move (old style Ford Starter BTW), but no spinning. So we went through it again, nothing was wrong, tried again, and still nothing.... Then we switched the jumper pack we where using, and bam it worked great.

 

[Torqueranger]

So the Explorer was starting good and then one morning the Sport just wouldn't start. When the trying to start, all I get is one click. Not sure if it's the solenoid engaging or the gear shooting out. The voltage is good on the battery and I've had it tested and charged twice at Autozone. I removed the starter as well and had that tested. It worked great at Autozone as well.

Today I measured voltage across the starter to the battery on a few spots:

1. Battery (-) to yellow ignition wire (S) - only 10.5 V when key is turned to start
2. Battery (-) to positive starter wire (B) - ~12 V +/-0.10
3. Starter Ground wire to battery positive - 12.14 V
4. Battery (-) to "solenoid to motor terminal" (M) with ignition wire (S) jumped from Battery (+) terminal - ~12 +/-0.10 V
5. Starter ground strap (attached to bottom starter mount bolt) to (M) terminal with key turned on - 11.98 V

Pic for reference

All the wiring looks like its checking out good unless the voltage going through the yellow ignition is not good. When trying to start the car I noticed the solenoid gets really hot. Possible sign that the voltage is not going to the starter.

I still think its the starter. Any thoughts?

Try jumping the green and yellow terminals with a screw driver and make sure not to touch anything else .. Oh I am not responsibly for any damage that might become of this and your are doing this under your own free will and accept all damages..

 

[Betsy98Sport]

Problem Solved

So I took everyones advice. I first pulled out the breaker bar and turn the crankshaft at the harmonic balancer bolt. Turned with ease so no seizing/hydrolock like one person swore it was.

Then I decided to pull out the starter to bench test it properly. Last time I didn't do it right and thought the starter motor was broke. I used this link to do it right. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PWG6Il_ZJI&feature=related. After the test, the solenoid was fine when I attached the jumper cables to (B) and ground and then used a small wire from (B) to (S) and it worked great. So I thought the starter works great.

However there's an additional test where you test only the motor by touching the positive jumper cable to (M). When I did this it would not spin:scratch: I noticed a little corrosion around that spot that I didn't notice before. I took a steel brush and scraped it clean. Tried it again and the motor test passed beautifully.

At this point removing and replacing the starter only took me 15 minutes after pulling it off so many times. I put the starter back on and tried to start the car and nothing this time. The battery voltage was low I noticed so I jumped the battery and bammm it worked like a charm. All it cost me was the shipping to my place and back (~$15) to RockAuto for a starter that did not fit for some reason. The new one probably would have worked if I could have got it to fit but I'll take the small loss.

The Sport lives again. I will post in the near future to let you know if its still all good. I may need to put some dielectric grease on the starter. It will help to prevent any more corrosion.