A few days ago, I did my first starter replacement, and swapped the starter off my 1995 parts buick to the 1997 L36 riv. Starter should be swappable betwween all years of this gen Riv. My starter had really weird dying symptoms that acted like a dead batter or corrosion more than a dead starter, but it was the starter which is completely dead. I'm hoping this thread might help others with replacing their starter. Once you know where everything is and what to do, it's incredibly simple to do. It took me a couple hours to do because I could't move at all under my car because my chest is too big, but if I did it again with a professional car life, I could do the swap in 10 mins given new starter in hand no problem.
This isif your starter is known dead. Best way to tell is to have someone be in the car and turn the ignition on and when it's not cranking, test the car at ground and the sense wire. If it see's 12 volts then your starter is bad, if there isn't voltage then it's either your ignition or something preventing voltage getting to the starter. Do this before wasting $200 on a new starter.
PREP/ TOOLS NEEDED:
-Jack stand
-Good jack
-Ratchet
-13mm socket
-15mm socket
-10mm socket
-8mm socket
-Flashlight
-Test light or multimeter for testing if starter is good
-Disconnect the battery ground terminal and the starter terminals before removing it
-For a better view of pics, right click and copy image address and paste it in a new tab
Starter is where my hand is trying to access from engine bay. That's useful to know for the hammer tap or to check terminals for corrosion without getting under the car. You can do that by feel pretty easily. My starter takes a 13mm bolt but the one on parts buick had a 15mm bolt for some reason.
Only get under your car with a good jack stand like this one otherwise if the hydraulics in the jack fails, your car will kill you. My Riv crunched the stock trunk jack in half just by changing a tire, so if I tried this with that and no stand, I'd be dead right now. Pretty important stuff. Mine is a 2 ton jack stand which is more than enough for our cars. Make sure to jack it up on a good structually sound location. I used the subframe itself which worked great. Also set the car on the jack stand on an equally strong spot. Iv'e seen people rip parts off their car by using bad jacking locations.
I'm pointing right at the starter motor. It's basically a high torque electrical motor that spins the flywheel and starts the car by moving the pistons and valves by rotating the crankshaft, air/fuel will go in as the starter rotates the engine crankshaft as the valves open, and your ignition will spark that fuel mixture and start the engine.
Disconnect the terminals which will be visible from under it. The positive battery terminal going to it should be either a 13mm or 15mm nut holding it to the starter, and the sense wire should be held in by an 8mm nut.
STARTER REMOVAL:
Follow instructions looking at the pics and it's super easy
There's a plastic cowl around the bolts that is held in by a single 10mm hex bolt. Its circled in orange. The 10mm wrench is around the bolt and the bolt is circled in red. Take the bolt off and the plastic housing comes right off. You will also be able to inspect the teeth of the cog on the flywheel by taking this off.
Okay so the 15mm hex bolts are where the yellow circles are. You can see my ratchet is right on the bolt that comes right out, and the other bolt is basically stock onto the starter to shimmy it in there and align it before you put in the second bolt.
This was me taking off the first bolt like a boss.
Tried to get a pic under the starter and you can barely see the terminal wires. The second bolt is on the other side of the starter from this ratchet further up. It will be easy to find when you look at it.
After you take the two 15mm bolts out, the starter pretty much slides right out. To install the new one, simple put the new one in, bolt the bolt that's attached to the starter housing in first but screw it in only a little to keep starter suspended, then align and screw in the second bolt a little, screw it slightly snug, then snug the second bolt, and then tighten the first bolt really tight, then the second bolt really tight. Attach the terminals back on, put the plastic housing back, set car back down and reconnect battery, and it should start right up.
This is the starter removed and you can see with 212,000 miles, the teeth on my flywheel are a little worn. The two holes there near the cog is where the starter botls to.
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These are the two starters next to each other. The new one is the smaller one on the left and the broken one is the bigger one on the right. The replacement was an upgrade for me because even though it's smaller, it's a high torque starter and starts much more smooth than I ever remember the car starting.
Teeth of my old starter, hard to see but they are a little worn.
The newer starter with brand new looking teeth. I'm pretty sure this is a really new starter even though the housing looks filthy. The housing is so dirty because parts buick had it's oil pan crushed. If you look at the teeth, you can see the area around it looks almost brand new near the bearings
Knowing how to do this will save you a lot of money for a starter replacement. I'm guessing it's probably $500 or more for a shop to do it with parts and labor, but if you go to a junkyard, you can probably pull a starter right off any 3800 series II or even a Series 1 car and get it for dirt cheap and replace it within an hour yourself. Mine was basically free,
