Could it be the starter?

[Digger]

On my 39, have a brand new battery, the car starts up instantly with the first press of the stater, drives great. After driving around on highways, in town for about half an hour, it died (on an uphill, of course). Upon hitting the starter, the motor did like an 1/8th turn, and no further. Called AAA, waited about 25 minutes, figured I would try it again, started right up. This has happened a few times.

Battery is brand new, carb is fresh and S clean, could it be the starter? Like it is heating up when driving? Any opinions welcome.

[fordwife]

Check and clean all battery cable, starter, and solenoid connections

[drolston]

Combination of died and no crank, then crank and run okay sounds very much like cable and/or cable connections. Some old cables look like they have clean ends and good connection, but are all green an disintegrated inside under the insulation.

[Lawson Cox]

Coil and/or condenser. My 2 ¢

[51 MERC-CT]

Originally Posted by Lawson Cox

Coil and/or condenser. My 2 ¢

You mean that a bad coil and condenser will only allow the starter to turn the engine
" 1/8th turn"

[Seth Swoboda]

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I have had a starter lock up on me. Pushed the starter button the engine turned over a small fraction and stopped. I rocked the car back and forth to free up the starter.

[waterboychuck]

I too think that it's not coil or condenser as that would allow the starter to turn over but not start the car. Like others clean all connections and use dielectric grease on connections.
Another suggestion would be only go downhill while driving.

[Digger]

Thanks guys, I will try all cables first, seems like everything is going downhill these days...

[Willit Stop]

Old Henry posted something a while back and it's something worth trying.If you're suspecting a poor connection,push the starter button for a couple of seconds or so and if it doesn't start,run your hand down the cables/wires.If you feel a warm or hot spot,there lies the problem.Usually (I'm guessing) the hot spot would be at one end of the cable or connection.
Good luck.Gene

[Capt Kirk]

I have had a similar problem and now that I've got all the other ones solved, I'm going to focus on this one. I have an Optima, the cables are all the correct size and new when I restored the car. I also added another "ground" from the battery directly to the starter mount. The car cranks like crazy when cold and does the same slow stalling on compression stroke when warm. This is temperature related. The battery isn't loosing it's ability because it warmed up. I don't think the connections or cables are gaining much resistance because of heat. Neither are that close to excessive heat. I'm still thinking about this and trying to reason it out but at this point I suspect that my very old starter isn't liking the heat.

[lafarm]

I had cranking trouble when engine warmed up sometimes had to bump it several times to get it to turn over, I pulled the starter off and took it to auto electric shop it checked out good, Then the tech said that sometimes the connection where the grounding brushes are connected with screws gets some corrosion under it and I did find some so I cleaned them and coated them with some nooxide grease put them back and cleaned the armature and that starter never worked so good even with hot engine.

[Tony, NY]

Check your ground cables from engine to frame and battery to frame.

[JM 35 Sedan]

It's also a good idea to make sure the interface area between front of starter housing, and where it mounts to clutch housing on oil pan, are all very clean, free of surface rust, paint buildup, and can provide a good path to ground. Also, make sure you have the little sheet metal bracket that bolts to the back of starter and one oil pan mounting bolt. This helps t secure/stabilize the backend of the starter and also provides another path to ground assuming contacting areas are clean.

[Lawson Cox]

Whoops. I misread the problem. My bad.