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| custom90 Member Since: 21 Jan 2010 Location: South West, England. Posts: 20263  
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It usually is poor grounding, poor main grounding or live supplies and connections.
It can be ignition switch, but that is far less common, sometimes the starter. Though usually if the starter, it produces poor charging voltage or the rectifier diodes are staring to go. Usually when you get the start up “click” it is poor batter clamps or main ground. Put a multimeter on the battery terminals and see what voltage it drops to when you go to crank, down to 9v can be common on a Defender but lower than that there is a problem. Defender starters draw an immense amount of current for a momentary period, so if there is high resistance it won’t crank. The same will apply if the battery voltage is below expected, you can sometimes though fairly rare get a dead cell in a battery that otherwise shows a decent voltage. Drop testing can show up these things more than basic testing. The most likely culprits are a failing battery or ground lead. Has the battery actually gone flat before or multiple times? There could be parasitic current draw, at rest draining the batter when not in use more than a typical low Milliamp current draw. Again, a Multimeter can detect that if set to measure Milliamps and in series to the battery leads at rest aka everything turned off and doors shut. It should read no more than 85mA max, typically around 18 to 45mA to be normal. In excess of 100mA or 0.1A and there is excessive parasitic draw, things like an incorrectly wired relay for spotlights can cause that for example the relay coil is constantly energised at rest with the engine and ignition off. Somewhere like Halfords or an independent with interest in 4x4’s would be able to help you if you need assistance, usually these things are more basic and easier to fix, but as you have found they are not always easy to identify. It has probably got worse recently due to the very cold weather lately, it’s likely a new battery is the first port of call but can be tested first. Are you able to check the battery voltage? If so, see if you can find out what it is after it’s been parked for a day or two. Check it before trying to start it. Below 12v is really discharged, 12.2v is fairly discharged and 12.6 or above is fairly good to normal. 12.3v to 12.8v after sitting for about a day is fairly normal I’d say. The voltage does need checking after at least one day, and before being started not after. But this is only a guide, it’s not a full battery test procedure. Hope that might help a bit, as it’s getting worse it’s likely battery, or parasitic drain current on the battery, or loose connections. Don’t forget the live side and the starter connections too of which if you do check that, disconnect the battery first.  |
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22nd Jan 2024 5:59pm |
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| Cuffy Member Since: 07 Sep 2017 Location: Essex Posts: 3  
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Thanks Steve, gives me a lot of possible solutions and will start working thru them and will let you know how it goes.
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27th Jan 2024 6:17pm |
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| custom90 Member Since: 21 Jan 2010 Location: South West, England. Posts: 20263
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Good luck.
If you may not have used a multimeter before, you can usually find most info in their instruction manual or a YouTube how to video. Usually the best approach is check the most basic things first, and if needed replace cheapest most basic items first. Nine times out of ten it’s something quite simple, the challenge is finding it. In my experience it’s normally a loose ground, or fixing, fitting or clamp(s) caused by vibration etc. If you do find anything loose use a small amount of low strength loctite such as 222 and it won’t happen again. Hope you find it soon. |
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27th Jan 2024 6:51pm |
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