JD 3046r tractor won't start, nothing has power when turn key, occasional clicking of relay under dash

[IndyIan]

I had basically a "rotten" battery positive cable end along with a couple inches of copper cable under the insulation. It looked "good enough" until I cut back some the insulation and that looked quite bad! I wonder if the battery clamp had some sort of impurities causing a galvanic corrosion with the copper? Anyways, cutting back to good wire and new clamp got it starting like new again.

 

[mikestern]

Hello all, I greatly appreciate your feedback and help.

I ended up testing using the multimeter at different locations starting from the battery. I would cycle the key on/off and do a reading, 12.8 everywhere on both until I got back to the place where the hot connects to a plate and then jumps to a bunch of smaller hots (to run to alternator, starter, etc.). I read the hot lead and the bolt and then the plate and the plate read 3.8v.

With that, I pulled the lead off, wire brushed it, applied dielectric grease and reconnected and voila, it was back up and running. Turned out being pretty simple once I started stepping back from the battery to determine where the power loss was.

Thanks so much!

 

[dodge man]

Good deal, thanks for coming back and telling us what was wrong.

 

[Ragin' Canajun]

Hello all, I greatly appreciate your feedback and help.

I ended up testing using the multimeter at different locations starting from the battery. I would cycle the key on/off and do a reading, 12.8 everywhere on both until I got back to the place where the hot connects to a plate and then jumps to a bunch of smaller hots (to run to alternator, starter, etc.). I read the hot lead and the bolt and then the plate and the plate read 3.8v.

With that, I pulled the lead off, wire brushed it, applied dielectric grease and reconnected and voila, it was back up and running. Turned out being pretty simple once I started stepping back from the battery to determine where the power loss was.

Thanks so much!

MikeStern I have a question. Before it quit trying to start entirely did it do some funky things, like engage the starter for a split second every second or so for a few times before finally cranking over, also give you a ECU code 1458.02 "ECU main relay data erratic, intermittent or incorrect"?