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Tue Apr 30, 2013 10:01 am

Here is an interesting little mystery I had to solve one morning recently.

One morning in January I went out to the parking lot and found my bus had been pushed up and over the parking curb and into the brick wall of my building. Of course my first thought was that some punks had been messing with my bus and pushed it over the curb as a prank. I was getting pissed. But there were no hand prints, dents, or any sign of the bus being manhandled. The back of the bus was quite dirty so any of this would have been obvious.

I put the bus in neutral, went back to the engine compartment and tried to rotate the fan a little bit by hand: it was locked up tight. When I disconnected the battery the engine freed itself up (thankfully) so I figured I had a starter problem.

As it turns out, my hot start relay shorted out and engaged the starter causing the Falcon to drive up and over the curb then bang into the brick wall and come to rest. The starter obviously remained engaged for a good period of time since parking my bus the night before. The starter is fried.This occured during a mild spell in January so there was lots of salt run-off on the roads and I had just returned from a trip a few hours North of Toronto. The salt water worked it's way into the relay as it sat over night. Now I can detest road salt for an entirely new reason.

Thankfully there was no damage done to any other vehicle or person, and only a little dent on my license plate. If I had have been parked 5 feet to the left the bus would have went up and over the curb and straight into the passenger side of my neighbors recently painted Mustang. You can see it parked in the back ground. Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you.

So I replaced the starter with my spare (without the hot start relay) and all was good. In fact I never needed the relay in the first place and wired it up a few years back only because it came with another engine I was installing and figured what the heck.

What if the bus had have been in neutral with the parking brake on? I think a couple hours of the starter self cranking the engine may have been worse.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:04 am

I guess that relay was a little bit too eager to help out. Glad nothing worse came of it.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:07 am

Can we sticky this thread for the next guy who posts that we are all full of BS when we say that this is a known risk with a hot start relay? Glad the wall was there to stop it before it really got out of hand.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:10 am

There's a ghost in your bus, eh?

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:18 am

I never understood why anyone would need to put one of those stupid things on a vw. If they were needed vw would have installed them at one time or another. I have own and operated 6 volt vw in -60F and didn't need one my vw never failed to start and it sat outside all winter if I didn't need one there you never need one.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:20 am

But it is such a cool addition??? Way better than correcting the original problem.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:35 am

Scary!
If you are going to use one of these make sure it's safely installed in the interior of the bus. :)

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:37 am

i think the earth tried to move and your bus stood its ground and saved the world! 8)

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:40 am

Bala wrote: Scary!
If you are going to use one of these make sure it's safely installed in the interior of the bus. :)

that way the evidence will survive the crash :lol:

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:49 am

SGKent wrote: Bala wrote: Scary!
If you are going to use one of these make sure it's safely installed in the interior of the bus. :)

that way the evidence will survive the crash :lol:

Show me one instance where a properly installed relay (not ford style) has failed like this.

It may not be your idea of a solution, but let's at least keep the facts straight and not spread misinformation.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 11:50 am

I remember thinking it was a dumb idea to install the relay after I swapped another engine into my bus. Especially since there was never any reason to use one in the first place. Guess I just figured I'd wire it up and give it a try since it was there. A mistake. Surprised it lasted as long as it did. These things seem a bit like a ticking bomb and you do not know when it is going to go off. I will not be doing that again. Hopefully no one else will either.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 12:48 pm

good thing you didn't park with the transmission in reverse!

Tue Apr 30, 2013 12:54 pm

Bala wrote: Show me one instance where a properly installed relay (not ford style) has failed like this.

Ok. Got me. How about this photo?

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:05 pm

SGKent wrote: Bala wrote: Show me one instance where a properly installed relay (not ford style) has failed like this.

Ok. Got me. How about this photo?

I said properly installed relay. It's not a big surprise the a relay subjected to salty road water would fail. I don't mean to be disrespectful to the PO, but that is just a very bad idea.

Millennium Falcon wrote: This occured during a mild spell in January so there was lots of salt run-off on the roads and I had just returned from a trip a few hours North of Toronto. The salt water worked it's way into the relay as it sat over night. Now I can detest road salt for an entirely new reason.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:08 pm

Guys,
I have a confession to make. You can kick me out of the club if you want to but I have to be honest on this one. Yes, I did install a hot start relay into a bus. There, I said it. I've been a member of the "it's just a bandaid" club for a very long time... until recently.

One of my car customers named Rick, a retired teacher, has a 1971 bus that I have worked on over the past couple years. In that time Rick has brought his bus to me for several jobs but mostly because it wouldn't crank. All in all I think I've tried probably 5 different times to fix this problem. I'd do something and it would crank and run fine. Then after 6 months or maybe less, Rick would bring it back and I'd start the cycle all over again.

I've cleaned all the grounds and cables
I've replaced the bushing, twice
I've changed the starter, twice
I've changed the ignition switch
I've checked the ignition switch connections to the harness

Each time I thought I'd fixed the problem only to have it's ugly head pop up once again. So finally I'd had enough. Alright damnit! I'm not only going to install a rebuilt Autozone starter, I'm going to go the extra mile and install my very first and only hot start relay in almost 40 years of working on these cars. I just happened to have a Ford style relay so I used that. So far so good. Wow, I feel better. Thanks for listening.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:20 pm

Ok aermech put out your hand and receive your punishment!

well at least you use a proper ford type relay that will hold up those little relays will not.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:24 pm

Quote: I said properly installed relay. It's not a big surprise the a relay subjected to salty road water would fail. I don't mean to be disrespectful to the PO, but that is just a very bad idea.

I resemble that remark. I did have a rubber housing around the relay for protection, thought it would last. Obviously that was far less than perfect.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:46 pm

I've had the same 40A Genuine Bosch hot-start relay on my daily-driver Westy for five years now with no failures or problems. It's mounted to one of the gas tank bulkhead screws near the pie tin, so the odds of it ever getting wet are pretty much nonexistent. Fires on the first or second crank too.

Put 'em where they'll stay dry and don't use a $5 cheapo relay and you'll be fine. I see plenty of good-quality 30-40A relays at the wreckers. Audi's are a good source...

Tue Apr 30, 2013 1:54 pm

aeromech wrote:

For what it's worth, that is a very nice, clean install. Well done.

Tue Apr 30, 2013 2:00 pm

For what it's worth, that is a very nice, clean install. Well done.

Thank you. I felt bad about not being able to fix the problem so all I charged Rick for was the actual cost of the rebuilt starter. I threw in my labor, the relay, and the other materials. He's a great guy and showed so much patience where some other customers would have gotten pretty ticked off. There was a promise of some beer in the future but so far I haven't seen any.