J-10 Starter Relay Water Shorting

[NBD925]

Jeep J-10 258 I-6

The Starter Relay in the engine compartment (stock Location) shooters out with water and or snow. I can see a spike on the volt meter when it shorts. The wires or terminals are not touching the fender but if it gets really wet or packed snow it seems to short. Anyone seen this before?

[tgreese]

Jeep J-10 258 I-6

The Starter Relay in the engine compartment (stock Location) shooters out with water and or snow. I can see a spike on the volt meter when it shorts. The wires or terminals are not touching the fender but if it gets really wet or packed snow it seems to short. Anyone seen this before?

Never noticed any connection to water or snow, but it is a common problem part. They wear out. One thing you might try is removing it from the fender, cleaning the fender and using new hardware with a shake-proof (toothed) washer to hold it down. The solenoid coil grounds to the fender through the bracket, and a bad ground could make it balky. Same with the other connections. A bit of dielectric grease might help, or maybe seal up any cracks in the solenoid body. Maybe make a boot or a bag to cover it, if water or snow gets up onto your inner fender top.

Standard Ignition used to be a good brand; their part number is SS581. They used to sell a blue high-end part SS581X that you may still be able to find. Avoid the SS581T or anything T series from Standard.

[NBD925]

I just gave Standard a call and they superseded the Blue Streak SS581X to just the SS581 they dumped the lower lines of that Switch. They now have a new Blue Streak line but this switch is not a part included in it. But The new SS581 has all the same parts the old Blue Streak SS581X was made with. Just the color was changed to black. This is all information the guy on the phone told me. It does look the same in the pictures except it’s black.

Thanks for the help. I will get these connections cleaned up and I might just order this part up.