Starter motors can be stripped and rebuilt (I've done it -- replaced brushes, skimmed the commutator (you don't undercut the insulation on a starter motor commutator, BTW) -- to save the cost of a new one). When are people going to learn that you do tests and make mesurements before replaceing parts. In this case, voltage tests directly across the battery terminals would have shown that the battery was OK, and a voltage test at the starter motor terminal would have shown the voltage drop in the cable/connections. Another useful trick is to measure the voltage across the earth strap using the 200mV range of a DMM. This will give an idea of the current flow in/out of the battery (effectlvely using the earth strap as a shunt), and can be used to ensure the alternator is actually charging the battery. You can turn on loads of known current (like headlights) to calibrate this measurement if you want to. A really nasty version of this happens when battery acid creeps inside the insulation of the battery cables. It will then corrode the wire, and leave a poor, high-resistance connection that will drive you insane. Two other car electrical faults that have caught me... Firstly, on a lot of UK cars the starter solenoid has 2 windings. One takes about 17A and is used to pull the core in. The other takes about 4A and is used to hold it in. Now the former is earthed via the starter motor (the resistance of this is _very_ low -- remember the stall current is often over 1000A). and is effectively shorted out by the solenoid contacts to turn it off when the solenoid pulls in. What this means is that the solenoid won't pull in if the starter is open-circuit, e.g. due to worn or sticking brushes. This does not seem to be well known -- certainly the so-called expert from the breakdown company didn't know it. I only figured it out when I looked very carefully at the schematic and started checking resistances of various components. The other one concerns the alternator. In a lot of cases, the startup supply for the field winding comes via the idiot light. This has 2 implications. Firstly, if the bulb burns out, then often the alternator doesn't charge. Secondly, if the field winding -- and remember this is on the rotor of car alternators -- goes open circuit, or if the brush gear goes open circuit, then the idiot light doesn't come on, even though there's no chargeing. It's a really poor design (the idiot light doesn't idictate a problem for a very common failure, namely worn-out brushes), but every alternator I've worked on uses the same circuit. -tony