Hello, i’m new and very inexperienced/lacking car knowledge so any and all help is appreciated! i have a 2000 s10 that won’t start, no crank, lights on dash come on and overhead lights work when clicked on, but when i try to start everything dies and all lights go black. will eventually start when hooked up to jumper cables. but something odd i found out today is that it starts up no problem when the parking break is engaged, why would that be and where should i look to further diagnose the problem?

 

First thing to check is the health of the battery. This becomes important when temperatures drop. Some things may work and others may not with a battery that is old and not able to deliver the current necessary but still has the voltage needed.

The best way to check this is with a proper tool at an autoparts store. Measuring the voltage alone is not sufficient.

 

hi sorry for the delayed response. so i got over to an auto parts store and had them check the battery, which is bad so that’s probably my first problem solved, and there was a pretty loose connection that is not tightened. but why would my car start up just fine with a bad battery ONLY if the parking break is engaged? does that mean there’s a bad sensor or fuse or something of that nature?
-Thanks

 

Making progress!

As for it only starting with the parking brake engaged, it could have been a coincidence or that some other system was energized electrically drawing battery power when the brake was released.