The truck will not start and is not even making the clicking noise. I have confirmed that my battery is good. You can't even jump the truck. It pretty random because it will work for a while and then stop starting. Then sometime even the interior and exterior lights will be dim or not work randomly. Not sure if I should just buy another battery because maybe something weird is happening with other one. Or is there are short somewhere that is causing this.

 

Welcome to the forum

Whats the voltage read on the battery?
You need to test battery voltage after its been sitting 4 or more hours, NOT just after charging
12.8volt is a new battery
12.5v is a 3 year old battery
12.3v is a 5/6 year old battery and time to shop for battery sales

12.2v or lower is a drain or bad battery

If jumping doesn't help then its one of two things
Bad battery cables <<<jumping battery is using same cables so if they are bad.............then no amps are getting thru
Bad starter motor

BOTH positive and negative battery cables have to be able to pass the 60-70amps needed by a starter motor, thats the way DC electrics work, for 60 amps to flow OUT of the battery 60 amps must be able to flow back IN, that's a circuit, a circle of voltage

So clean the ends for BOTH cables at the battery and at the starter(positive) and engine(negative)

If starter motor is bad it draws too many amps or doesn't work at all
But starter relay should "click" when you first turn the key to START, if that doesn't happen then most likely battery cable issue(or battery voltage is too low)

 

I have some more into for you. I let car sit for some hours with battery disconnected. I then reconnected the battery. When you open the door the dome lights comes on and when you put the key in the ignition the dash lights come. When you try to start it makes one click and all the lights go out. When you open the door again the dome lights don't come on and the dash lights are off as well. when you try to start it the theft light flashes fast. Based on info from other post it appears to be PATS issue. I get PATS code of 1:6 indicating faulty link between PATS and EECV. I tried to swap out the PCM relay but not change. I took some multi meter reading listed below:

all measurements use battery negative for ground

with key in off position
12.36 volts on the battery
6.00 volts at the starter

with key in on position
12.35 volts on the battery
5.0 volts at the starter
PCM fuse #6 is 5.3 volts
PCM Relay fuse #8 is 5.3 volts
PCM Power Relay ping 30 has 5.3 volts and pin 86 has 5.0 volts

I appreciate any help you can provide.

 

starter needs 12 volts to work. whats going on

 

Battery cables................................thats the problem, clean them or replace them

PATS 1:6 also means NO VOLTAGE

 

OP replace your damn starter cables 👍

 

I've already replaced the starter cables, battery cables and battery terminals. Think issue maybe at distribution box or something. I can take some measurement with the starter disconnected to see if the starter solenoid is doing something weird.

 

It wouldn't be the first time I've seen a internally broken battery terminal, makes good enough contact to show voltage, just not good enough for the amperage required to start an engine.

 

Sorry to hijack this post, but mine is doing the same thing. I've created a post myself, but no one has responded. Sooooo, here goes:
1999 Ranger 3.0L 4x4 automatic.
79,800 miles
No crank, replaced starter thinking that was the issue, battery is at 12.78 volts after sitting on the charger all day, all fuses checked out okay, relays under the hood will click when key is in the start position. Fans blows, light on dash come on. When I turn all the way to start the truck, all lights on the dash and in the interior turn off, then come back on when I release the key. Theft light isn't blinking rapidly. Checked battery cables, and they had some surface oxidization, but nothing terrible. The cable ends are new, so I took them off, cleaned off the green oxidation on the copper wires and put cable ends back on. I also crawled under the truck and took a screwdriver to arc the starter and I can here the starter motor wind up, but the engine doesn't crank.

I recently replaced the transmission and it ran for 3 days before this issue happened. Called them and asked about the neutral safety switch (or whatever Ford calls it) and informed them that I tried starting in Neutral with no luck either. They would like to check their work to make sure that they didn't miss a harness or clip a wire when install the transmission, so I would need to tow there.

Any thing else that I might be missing?

 

I answered in your other post seen here: https://www.ranger-forums.com/genera...anking-162161/

 

I FIXED IT!!!!!!

I will tell what my issue was in case someone runs into the same thing.

When RonD said "PATS 1:6 also means NO VOLTAGE" it made realize that based on the other checks I did that nothing was getting enough voltage. That is why the cab light would not come on and headlights wouldn't come on either. So I then measured the voltage at X-01 which the main power connection to the distribution block. I was only getting 6 to 5 volts on this connection going to the distribution block so made sense why nothing was getting enough power. I disconnect the connections from X-01 and connected the battery and was able to get battery voltage on the wire when not connected to X-01. On the X-01 connection there is a 120 AMP fuse. So I thought that was the problem so I replaced it but it didn't fix it. Still not getting enough voltage to the distribution block. So I removed the relays from slot 1,2,3,13 and 14 also removed the fuses from slot 14 ad 15. Now with relays and fuses removed I'm getting battery voltage to the distribution block. I added the relays and fuses one by one to see which one was causing a problem. To my surprise I reattached all the relays and fuses but still had battery voltage to distribution block. Now my truck starts fine. So, my guess is one of the relays wasn't in its connection good and was possibly only bridging connection slightly to cause low voltage. Thanks for the help guys.

 

Good work

Thanks for the update

But still not sure on what the fix was?
Maybe a bad connection on the engine fuse box BUS bar

 

I had the same issue a few months back. My issue was the grounds. Added an additional ground to the block and haven't had the issue since.

Glad that @iedwards23 your truck is fixed.