Well, we were all wrong. I went over to his house this morning. Took a 5 gallon buck of tools, meter, jumpers, jump pack, grinder, ect. Also had my truck and trailer with winch. Thats another story.
He had done a good job cleaning up and actually replacing the ground. Both 6 volt batteries were in good condition showing 6.3 volts and at the starter we had 12.51 volts. I held the meter and had him crank it, it does have a compression release, and the key switch lead had a good solid 12 volts on it the entire time. Like he said, it makes a winding sound. Anyway took off the starter and bench tested it with jumper pack on the tail gate of his pickup. It works as it should. By the way, he now has two starters, the old one and a starter that Tommy sold him. Tried both with the same results. I then pulled the injectors and rotated the engine by had to make sure it was not locked up, its not.
We had the starter in and out 3 times in a hour trying to even jump start it directly to the starter bypassing the batteries and the key switch jumping the solenoid with a screw driver. No luck, just winding.
We then decided to load it on my trailer so I could take it home. Not easy with the loader on the ground. Got it about half way up and a pop came from the winch. Gear box exploded. So we then tried to pull it up on with he 2 wheel drive Dodge truck but it did not have the guts to do it so we used a come along to get it 99% of the way up and finished it off with the truck. I secured it and got it to my shop.
I took the starter out and checked things once again and thats when things did not look right to me. I got out my tape measure and here is what I found. The face of the flywheel is 2 1/8" from the back side to the starter mount flange. The front side of the flywheel is 1 1/2". When I measured the starter its only set up to throw the pinion gear out 1 5/8" measured by me. There is no way that 1/8" of mesh is enough. So the whining sound is just that, the starter spinning up as it should but not meshing good, especially with the pinion gear having a relief cut in at they do.
I have confirmed its a Tractor King 404(sold by Rural King), and it has a SL3105BT 3 cylinder engine in it. The starter that is in it, the new one Tommy sold him, is a QDJ1408. It looks like the old starter that was in it but I do not have it at my house to compare measurements. My guess is its wrong also and someone threw the wrong parts at it and got frustrated and sold it at auction. Now we need the right starter and I will have to bleed the injectors once I get it cranking and she should run.
As for the trailer winch issue, the gear box is shot. I check online and its available cheap so I will just replace it. Should have used a snatch block with this beast.
Chris
