Hi, I have a 2000 Chevy Blazer 4dr 2wd,150k miles.
After I replaced fuel pump and fuel injector I started car couple of times but I heard some metal crush noise then the starter is making grinding noise. So I tested the starter with the screw driver method, it spun strongly and gear was sticked out with no problem.
Then I tried to shim the starter with 20,40,60,80 shims but same thing happened,it just making grinding noise. 80 was the thickest shim that I could put in between starter and mounting block and it made a short contact with flex plate less than one sec then grinding noise came out again. I also painted the couple of teeth on the starter and tried again when 80 shims installed, it seemed like starter teeth didnt engage at all.
I just checked flex plate by rotating the crank pully by hand, it didn't seem like losing some teeth, so I assume the flex plate is good. All the electrical connections are good as well as the battery.
So can anyone tell me what is wrong with it? bendix drive maybe? I will be very appreciated if anyone can give some advices.

 

i had a simular problem on my 2001 silverado and it ended up being the flex plate i was driving with it like this for about 2 months and didnt realize how bad it was till i pulled the tranny... lol

 

Yeah... I can see those cracks on the center,according to your experience mine could be gone too?

 

it is a possibility i would take the starter off and grab ahold of the flex and see if you can get any movement out of it without turning the motor u may have to unbolt the torque converter from the plate to check this

 

No the flex plate didn't move as I reached my hand into that starter hole. No plays at all.

 

did you unbolt the torque converter from the plate first ? the other thing you can do is have someone with a socket wrench on the harmonic balancer to turn the motor while you are down there looking at the flex plate to see if it is warped while it turns

 

You are on the right track. Either Bendix drive or the flex plate is bad. Put a starter in it first because it is easier and if that doesn't fix it remove the trans and replace the flex plate too.

 

Wow lot's of stuff. Lets try this. Fuel pump starts to malfunction from bad ground from battery to block? Just an idea but it could cause high resistance to starter making it not toss the bendix not out hard enough. Coincidence of bad starter and fuel pump taking crapp at the same time seems far fetched. I would look for a ground problem.


So many times I have found a bad main ground from the battery and just caused a butt load of problems.