Good Morning Guys. I have an '03 Monte Carlo SS, 3.8L with 101K miles. In the last 3 or 4 months, there have been 4 or 5 times where it just won't start, leaving my wife stranded - well at least for several minutes until it cranks over. When this happens, it will not click, crank - nada - but the lights are good, radio blares, etc... The battery is relatively new and no issues with the alternator.

What do y'all think it might be? Should I try replacing the starter? I'm not much of a wrench but I think I can do it if it would fix this weird problem (one of the ONLY problems this car has given me in 6 years BTW!)

I'd love anyone to chime in with their opinion.

Thanks!

Clarkster (newbie)

 

I had a similar problem in my '01. It was the ignition switch. ALMOST always started within 10 minutes, well almost. Not the last time.

 

That's another possibility as well - the ignition switch. Hmmmm.... I just received an answer from AskChevy.com. The mechanic suggested replacing the Crank Relay in the fusebox first. Waddya think?

 

i'm having same problem right now. after driving for 30 minutes, go back out to start it and no start! try a few times but after 10 minutes it starts like nithing wrong at all. it happened a couple times a few months ago and went away, now last 5 days ,happening again. hope we get a for sure remedy .

 

Do you know if the security light is blinking when this happens?

 

I had been dealing with the same problem for the past couple weeks...at first I just had to turn the key a couple times to get it to fire up. Then it got to the point to where I had to do it numerous times to get it to fire. Got even worse, had to **** it to neutral to get it to fire up, and then it just started firing up when it wanted to regardless of if it was in neutral or not.

I took it to the shop on Wednesday and just picked it up last night, they replaced the shift control switch....part was $255, and an hour of labor to install as well as an hour to diagnose so out the door I paid $455 and some change.

 

My 03 Monte Carlo SS is doing it again!!! Grrrrrrrrrrrr!!! Every so often, it won't crank over. The lights, radio etc all work fine. Relatively NEW battery. It hasn't happened in over 3 months until again this morning. It was happening every couple of weeks or so last fall. An Ask Chevy mechanic suggested I replace the crank relay (located under the hood in the fusebox area). $11 part so I tried that. Obviously that's NOT the problem.

Someone else stated they had the same problem and it ended up costing about $500 for a shift control switch (see above). The problem is that it's an intermittent thing and as soon as it does crank up, it'll probably be fine for a while. Hard to detect WHAT it is when it's working OK. This is getting to be a PITA because it's my wife's car and she's been stranded at work a couple of times.

Any ideas short of going that $500 route? (That might not fix it either!)

 

take it to the dealer and find out the problem. $80 or so for them to diagnose the problem

 

But do you think they'll be able to locate the problem once its cranking just fine again? That's the deal. Unless I call a tow truck right now and get it into the service dept. while its still acting up, it'll start cranking over fine again...for several weeks probably.

 

See? 20 minutes later, I go outside and it starts just fine! Weird I tell ya!!!