Hi,

My 2014 Focus 1.6Tdci is at the garage for it's fourth replacement starter motor in four years. Has anyone else had this problem and found out why? The mechanic at the last replacement said there was no build up of swarf or anything like that in the removed starter. I would be interested to hear if any one has experienced this and found a cause?

Are you fitting top branded starters or just cheap ones?  Do you do a lot of starts in a day (courier/carer/takeaway deliveries etc)?  I haven't seen many starters fail on these at all tbh, definitely not 4 in a row, just the odd one on high milers as you'd expect with any car really.

They have all been original Ford parts. The original starter failed in less than two years from new and have been yearly since. I only do two to three starts per day on average and I don't use the stop start so rather confused!

39 minutes ago, Tim Spouge said:

They have all been original Ford parts. The original starter failed in less than two years from new and have been yearly since. I only do two to three starts per day on average and I don't use the stop start so rather confused!

Very odd in that case, I'm confused as well!  

All I could suggest is that something has a slight manufacturing defect which is putting extra wear on the starter.  Gearbox casing being very slightly off for example, meaning the starter is hitting the ring gear at a slight angle instead of head on.  I can't think of any way you could prove or rectify that though!

So what fails, is the failure mechanical or electrical eg. Chewed up cog? Carbon brushes, solenoid? Have they all failed in exactly the same way? There must be something causing it and the exact nature of the failure might give a clue, eg. Ring gear fault

Each time It has always been the same pattern, solenoid kicks, lamps cut out so must be something causing the windings to short out. My only thoughts were swarf or possibly the heat causing winding insulation to break down.

As an update the local garage removed the starter motor, put in a different starter but the car still wouldn't start (as in no attempt to turn over the engine at all). The original starter motor was then bench tested and worked fine, so the original was refitted and all good. So this must have either reset some electronics, disturbed an electrical connection/cable, or maybe even removed some kind of obstruction from the starter pinion/flywheel.

It remains a mystery why it originally couldn't be jump started and attempted starting shut down all the lights.