No star, no click problem

[Andy D]

Heh heh. The fact you can cross the hot on the fender mounted relay and start it , eliminates a lot of the more serious troubles. The OP should work from the "start" position and move toward the fender mounted relay. My son had a Swiss army knife and 5 lbs of keys on the key ring of his college beater 86 528e. The weight put the kibosh on the start position of the igntion switch. I rigged a starter button on some 12 awg cable and mounted it in the dash. It was simpler than messing with removing the lock and then the switch. YMMV

 

[Shoddy Cologne]

1994 should have the starter relay built into the starter solenoid located on the starter motor, at least my '94 4.0l does.

So on the starter motor you should have 2 wires hooked up, the large battery positive cable.
And then the smaller "S" wire attached as well, Red/light blue stripe wire, this wire comes from Clutch switch on manual models and NSS switch on automatics.

Older Fords had the Starter Relay on the inner fender, not on the starter motor/solenoid, battery positive and starter motors large cable hooked up to the two larger posts on this Relay.
And the "S" wire, red/blue stripe also hooked up here to the smaller "S" terminal.

These two different systems don't have interchangeable parts.
There can only be 1 starter relay, it is either built into the starter motor or on the inner fender.
During the transition years Ford had what "looks like" a starter relay on the inner fender, it was just a power distribution point for the older setup until main harnesses could be changed.

If you got a starter motor with relay built in and then tried to use it with inner fender relay setup it wouldn't work, and visa versa.

Simply test would be to find the "S" wire, red/blue stripe, then hook up volt meter to it.
When key is turned all the way to START you should see 12volts on that wire, 0volts with key in any other position.
If not then go to Clutch Switch, you will see a Red/Blue stripe wire there, but it comes from ignition switch, it should have 12volts when key is turned to START.
If it does then clutch switch is probably bad, there is a PINK wire coming out of clutch switch that splices into the Red/blue stripe "S" wire that goes to starter relay, you can test this pink wire also, it is possible that the splice is bad.
If so then you can either track splice down or run a new "S" wire from the Pink wire to starter relay


Confusion on some terms:
Starter Solenoid is the tube on top of the starter motor, when powered it pushes starter gear into ring gear(flywheel), and when unpowered it pulls gear back away from ring gear.
Starter Relay passes power to starter motor/solenoid.

The fender mounted relay Ford used for many years was just that, a relay, but often called a solenoid, which is fine as long as everybody knows what part is being talked about.
A Solenoid causes movement when activated or deactivated
A Relay passes power or cuts power when activated and deactivated

It Is possible to have more than one starter solenoid. Many older FLD Freightliners have 2 solenoids. However in this circumstance . There is only one lol


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[Shoddy Cologne]

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[RonD]

It Is possible to have more than one starter solenoid. Many older FLD Freightliners have 2 solenoids. However in this circumstance . There is only one lol


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Well if you go by "others" definitions, then new cars/trucks have over 30 "solenoids" not just one on starter motor, probably 15 under the dashboard alone, battery saver solenoid, head light solenoid, three 4WD solenoids, window solenoids, list goes on and on.

Just joking

 

[Shoddy Cologne]

Well i did mean two starter solenoids. It doesnt make sense but they have one on the firewall and one on the starter. They like to go bad alot too.. Lol

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[AaronJ94]

Well after much procrastinating, I am getting around to my ranger this week with an electrician, but I have fiddled with it a bit. I have tried using a paper clip to bypass the clutch position sensor to see if I have a bad one and that would not appear to be the case. I have double checked all battery and starter connections as well as clean off the ground for the starter relay on the inner fender. I have not had the opportunity to have a partner attempt a start while I check with a multimeter but that is next. I will keep posted if I find anything, and thank you all for the replies! I have read them multiple times lol

 

[AaronJ94]

Going well until..

So I could never figure out the problem on the ignition so we bypassed it with a start button. I still need the key in the on position but the button is wired to the solenoid. And that has been going well for a week, week and a half. I go to warm my car up this morning, 9° with wind here in northern KY, and after about 10 minutes I heard an explosion! Fluid dripping everywhere so I shut it off and come to find my top radiator hose had a huge hole. So I will be flushing and replacing hoses next! On thing about my ranger is that it always has a project for me lol.

 

[Mark_88]

Ouch....I hope you didn't spill your coffee...

With that temperature it shouldn't be frozen coolant...I would hope...were you running anti-freeze in the system or was it straight water?