It clicks but won't start

O.K. my wife just droped it off, she had to jump it to start it. It ran for about 15 miles w/o incident, so I'm thinking battery. No idiot lights or the infamous check engine light. She pulled into the driveway, shut it off and know it makes a clicking sound in the front and rear relays? It kind of sounds like the blinker is on. You can here the sound up by the steering wheel and near the tailgate latch/taillight. Everytime it makes the click, the security light flashes and if the ignition is in the on position or if the dome light is on they all flash in unison with the click? Before I start to tinker with this thing, has anyone else had this happen when the battery dies?

I never had a vehicle with the security package on it, so I don't know what kinda of crazy things they do when something wears out like this.

I would definately say it's the battery. If you were able to jump it and it stayed running on it's own with out trying to stall out or run rough or anything it sounds like the battery is toasted. The relay you're hearing in the front of the Jeep is probably the relay for the starter motor. As for the one in the back you hear, maybe thats the fuel pump or something?

The clicking was because she shut it off, but left the headlights on. The battery was so dead it wasn't lighting them up. I guess it had enough juice to energize the relays, but not much else. I'm going to get another battery an d see what that does. I feel a little better know that I know why it was clicking.

I thought all KJs automatically shut off the headlights? Mine does... (Thankfully, because I have a habit of doing that in a rush.)

On ours if you leave them on after you shut the car off, the turn the lights off they have a delay. Ours is an '02 and I'm pretty sure that if I don't turn them off they will just stay on, but honestly I've never tried.

On mine when you shut the car off before the lights, the lights will stay on for like 30 seconds or a minute or something like that and then shut off.....it's a safety thing. But if you turn on the lights with out the engine running, they will go off in I believe 7 minutes. But they will definately go off.

I used to have an old International Scout II, Diesel, it would eat batterys like a 4 year old going through candy. Year at the most. Everytime it wouldn't start I get out the hammer and smack the top of the battery, it would start up right away. Weird. I'm not suggesting you try that though.

Scout! Sweet!

The auto off lights must have started in for the '03 model year.

If you have an EVIC, you can adjust the delay time. Mine is set for 90 seconds.

Ya, I've got the EVIC. However, I'm not going to even try to program that thing. I was hoping that I wouldn't have to re-calibrate the compass after swapping out the battery (which seems to have been the problem). I haven' had the alt. put on a tester though.

The fact that the engine can keep itself running after you jump it, pretty much rules out the alternator. If the alt were shot, it would start when you jump it, run for a few seconds, then die again.

I've had the integrated voltage regulator blow out on one and it was generating too many amps, it would fry the battery and not turn on the idiot light. In that scenario it would run because it was producing more than enough to run the vehicle, but the battery just couldn't absorb the excess charge. I don't think that is the case here though. I would hope that an alternator would last better than 56,000.

marlonjbt said:

Scout! Sweet!

The auto off lights must have started in for the '03 model year.

If you have an EVIC, you can adjust the delay time. Mine is set for 90 seconds.

Click to expand...

02 and my lights shut off after some time...

sounds like you have a dead cell in the battery

get a multimeter and check it out

Its the battery. My wife hit the switch on my driving lights awhile back and it was the same thing. click, click, click

engine won't turn over

looks like I'll be calling road side assistance to help me with this one, I can't figure out why my Jeep wouldn't start this morning. In the on position, it would not crank over, just clicking noises like it's trying to start. My inclination is the battery but with only 19,000 km, that's strange. I can't remember if I left any lights on either. If anything, I might have left the dome light on but I don't recall. It's been over a week since I last started the vehicle. Does the battery discharge this quickly over the dome light?

rob

On mine actually, unless you turn on the dome light with the stalk, they will also go off after like 7 minutes or so. But if you did leave them on by using the switch on the headlight stalk, then yes, it will kill the battery pretty quick. Do you have a neighbor who has a set of jumper cables or anything? Perhaps try getting a jump off one of them and see if you can't get it running. If you do, let it run a bit, or drive it around for a while to get the battery charged back up good.

Too bad automatics are easier to jump start by rolling it. Manual transmissions certainly has its advantages. drive.gif