Ok guys I could use some help. My 2006 HHR will only start by jumping it off I have had the alternator, battery, and starter tested by Auto Zone, Napa, and Advanced Auto Parts. They all said the parts were good. Car trys to start but then just clicks, hook cables to the battery and it starts right away. I put a new battery in and the same thing happens. The starter started to smoke so I had it replaced. There is no loss of power while the car is running even if I disconnected the battery. Any help would be very much appreciated.

 

Check the battery terminal clamps, they have been known to crack.

 

The starter tested good but was smoking? Sounds kind of like a corroded wire; the wire to the starter goes to the front connector on the under hood fuse box then directly to the battery. That nut sometimes loosens and corrodes.

 

Check the ground wires, at the transmission and rad cradle. Clean and tight?

 

Well, Ydnar (Randy) came back to his thread last night. Guess we'll just need to wait for him to come back again and update his thread.

 

We’ll wait and see!

 

One time I was having issues on a different car and took the alternator to autozone, the only place close by that offered bench testing. Dude hooked it up and followed the prompts on the machine. As the machine went through the test the pinion popped out and spun like it's supposed to but it started smoking.. at the end of the test it asked if it had indeed popped out and spun and the guy pressed yes. The machine concluded that the starter was good. While the smoke on the starter made it obvious to me that it was bad when I asked him if it's supposed to smoke like that the guy shrugged and said that it tested good. As you all guessed by now the starter was the issue and needed to be replaced. Anywho, sounds like a loose or corroded connection as already stated. Look forward to the update! P.S. While it was common back in the day to disconnect the the battery while the car was running to test the alternator, it's not a good idea these days as it creates a spike in voltage that can result in damaged electronics, in the future use a multimeter or a 12v battery/alternator tester that you can get for 5 bucks at harbor freight. (they used to give multimeters away for free!)

 

Thanks for the input so here's an update it turns out that the alternator was actually draining the battery instead of charging it, which in turn ruined the battery. I went ahead and replaced the battery, the alternator, and the cables. So far I've not had any issues so far but I will be watching very closely and keep you guy's informed.

 

Thanks for the follow up! Glad you got it fixed!