Like many of the other posts I read up on this morning, my day started the same. Wife and I went outside to leave for work, pile into the 4Runner ('00 automatic), turn the key- silence. The dome lights work when the doors are open, didn't notice if the headlamps worked or not, but the dash didn't give so much as a flicker when the key was turned. Door locks seemed labored when we were switching back to the other car for the day. But I checked everything over, and I can't find anything that was left on to drain the battery.

I had knee surgery last week, so I didn't have time to to jump out and get under the hood. What normally takes me 30 seconds takes me 2 minutes with the brace and crutches, and I couldn't waste the time before work. I'm going to try jumping it off my garage queen when I get home (luckily parked nose-to-nose!) and check the battery connections while I'm at it, but this is so out of left field- whenever I've had dead batteries previously I had some sort of warning symptoms. The Runner been my daily driver since Easter, and it's been strong as an ox. I guess it did fail to start on the first try driving home yesterday, but my wife was at the wheel and I just kinda wrote it off that she didn't turn the key long enough. Second try it roared to life as usual.

We had the hardest rain I've seen in a while yesterday- hard enough that I thought it was hail at first- and I had it parked outside on an incline. It was still wet when we went out this morning. I'm wondering if that could have anything to do with it? I noticed a few others mentioning rain in their starting issue posts also.

 

yer starter needs a whack with a hammer


and then the contacts replaced [or a refurb starter]

 

Thanks, I'll make that step 3 of the process after checking battery output and terminal connection quality.

 

like others have said, toyota starters are bulletproof. so, a $20 starter contact replacement kit would fix the problem (and will be my fix when the time comes). i've heard good things about refurb'd starters too, but $20 vs. ~$150 makes it a simple choice in my book. good luck!

 

Good to know.

Just trying to "will it" into not being the starter. I like to do my own work when I can, but I'm not allowed to walk for another 5 weeks and I don't like the idea of the runner being down for that long, even if we do have alternative transportation. Sounds like the voices of experience are telling me that that's what I'm dealing with, though.

 

Well, got home, put the meter on it and sure enough, very very dead battery. Depleted enough that it took a minute or two to get to go off the jumper cables. BUT- right off the bat with the cables, the starter did the "click" of life, so that's pleasing. I'll charge it back to full and see what it does overnight, probably have to replace the battery tomorrow if it's as shot as I think it is.

 

easy solutions are always the good ones.

 

My DieHard Battery died unexpectedly, just wouldn't hold a charge. Bought a new one and it has been fine ever since. Could be same issue.

 

If your dash lights didn't come on when you turned the key - you got a DEAD battery. When the dash lights come on and the starter goes "click" then you got worn contacts. I had about 175K on my starter in my V6 Camry before the contacts gave. I think that is about normal, like it was mentioned Toyota (Denso) starters are bulletproof. They can go through about 3 sets of contacts before the actual starter gives out.