I'm gonna hope that it's a cheap set of jumper cables and that the connection wasn't solid enough to make it start.

 

Motor is not seized and your starter is most likely fine. Your battery is dead. Lights will work with less than 12 volts, but starter needs over 12 to turn.


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Motor is not seized and your starter is most likely fine. Your battery is dead. Lights will work with less than 12 volts, but starter needs over 12 to turn.
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This ^.

Cell most likely going bad in the battery and a warm car can put more of a load on the starter due to tighter clearances.

 

My guess is the battery. Possibly the alternator? I damn sure wouldn’t have taken it to the Stealership first tho, but that’s me

 

could have popped one of the high amp fuse's also with voltage being that low

 

I would have bought a battery and tried that first.

 

I tried a Jump Box to no effect. Then I tried a Sierra 1500 with jumper cables to no effect. I let the car sit connected with the jumpers for 30 minutes to no effect. When the flatbed showed up, the driver insisted on trying his Jump Box to no effect. I know was I getting a connection up front because the Jump Box meter reading would drop when I got a good connection (and I got the sparks you'd expect to see when connecting Jumpers). Turn the key to ON, power seemed to be fine. Turn the key to crank the motor, all the lights shut off exterior, interior, dash. But the only clicking you could hear were a few relays. No noise at all from the Starter. It behaved like a dead battery but that assumption seems invalid given connecting external power made no difference to how it behaved...

I did replace the battery last spring. And a few weeks later the car behaved like the battery was dead. However, I discovered the stupid positive battery terminal clamp was loose (because it's stupid the way it's designed. Gimme a friggin' nut I can crank down on, please, not some stupid spring loaded lever thing). It started cranking slow towards the Fall. I initially guessed my problem last night was that the clamp was loose again, but no, it's on the positive terminal good and tight, can't budge it.

 

A jump box and cables will get full voltage to a discharged battery but will still not get enough amps to turn the engine over if the original battery is damaged internally (say a cell sulfating or a strap corroding) pretty much have to replace the battery before it will work. Of course, loose cables with give similar results.

 

Every time I think it’s not the battery, it’s the battery! Just me tho 🤷🏼

 

This is the truth. Bad Battery and Loose battery connections cause all kinds of problems.

 

That'd be nice if it's just the Die Hard (easy) battery. But if the battery had an open cell, I wouldn't have gotten any lights when I turned the key to ON. And if it was a shorted cell, I wouldn't have seen 11.6V on the DIC, it would have been lower. An open cell would explain why I didn't get sparks when I connected the Jumper to the battery terminals. But it can't be an open cell since the battery was still producing some juice.

Got my fingers crossed, though. Nothing to do but speculate until they call me and tell me what they found.

 

Ok so I admit I’m a very cynical guy, but trust me, the stealership will find a whole lot wrong with it!
Listen to timan, this gen has issues.

 

on a much less complicated electrical system I had a car with a battery only a few months old.
Would crank, not start, lights worked, etc
I tried everything, changed the starter twice.
My friend said "your battery is bad". I said no way its only a few months old and its cranking fine just not starting
Brought it in for a replacement under warranty and the guy load tests it- it tests fine says he isnt replacing it.
I said please test each cell - sure enough one bad cell.
Went home and that damn car started right up.

I know you were at a cigar shop but I would have tried a battery first, its not like you didnt need one anyhow.

 

This second generation CTS has the most finicky electronics I have ever known (well, maybe my MGB with Lucas electronics was more of a bitch, but Lucas electronics either worked or didn't). Over on the standard CTS forum we talk about electronics a lot. And a bad or low charge battery is quite often the cause. Batteries are the first thing we talk about with electrical issues. It applies here as well.

 

GM designed the group 101 battery for the first CTS-V to keep Delco/Delphi in business.
It sure wasn't a better battery.

 

Did the DIC read 11.9 with the jumper connected?

 

Similar thing happened to me a couple years ago. It had been cranking kinda slow. Then, all of the sudden at the airport of all places, I came back from a trip and nothing. Electronics on, all that, but no cranking. Tried jumping it with another car and a jumper box. Had to have FOUR tow trucks come until they finally listened to me that a flatbed couldn't get into the parking garage and I needed a traditional tow truck. At any rate, went to the dealer, new starter and good to go.

 

Sounds like my problem. I was leaning strongly in that direction already.

Dealership didn't get back to me today, so I'm assuming they haven't started the car. No big deal. Not like I wanted to make some poor sap work late to try and figure it out and get it done on Christmas Eve.

 

So my 2014 Coupe has been cranking "slow" for the last few months. I assumed the crappy Die Hard battery was failing, so I threw a set of jumper cables in the back and forgot about it. Haven't been driving the car a lot, anyway. Went to run an errand last night, was worried the car might not start, but it cranked twice slowly, and kicked off running as it had been doing. Took the long way to the Cigar store to give it extra time to recharge. Parked it, went in to buy my box and shoot the shit for 10 minutes. Went back out, cranked the car, I got maybe half a crank and it refused to crank further. Fuck. Got out the cables and tried to jump it. No joy. Had to have it flat bedded to the local dealership.

Weird thing was, if I connected the jumpers at the jump-point in the engine bay, I'd get sparks. But if I connected the cables to the battery in back, I wouldn't. Yet all the lighting was working and, in fact, the headlights were bright. The DIC reported 11.6V. Even with the jumper cables connected. And if I tried to crank the car, all the lighting would go dark but I didn't get any noise from the Starter, no clicks or anything. Of course I was parked where it was impossible to try and push start it so I didn't try that (MN6).

So now I'm waiting to hear back from the dealership. I'm thinking either the starter motor shit the bed or the motor is seized.

Anyone want to take a guess which?

Happened to the wife’s 2013 coupe. End up being a bad ground.

 

Well hopefully it’s a simple fix, either cable,battery or starter

 

Wiring gremlins are the worst. I wish engine failures on all my friends and electrical issues on all my enemies.

 

Wiring gremlins are the worst. I wish engine failures on all my friends and electrical issues on all my enemies.

Truth.


But yeah, check grounds to battery, engine bay fuse block and starter. Check fuses.

Replace battery anyway.

Then replace the starter (probably your culprit).

If that doesn't work - there may be fusible links but I'm not familiar.

If all of that fails, you might have to pull the radiator and put a breaker bar on the crank bolt and see if it turns by hand to make sure the motor isn't FUBAR. But this is pretty unlikely.



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It's a bad starter, or the engine has seized. Those are the only explanations that fit the symptoms. Electrical system works fine until I turn the key to crank the engine and then, everything shuts off while the key is turned to START. No clicks from the starter motor makes me lean in the direction of the starter. If the motor was seized, I should hear the starter banging against the flywheel. And I got a partial crank from it before it died completely. But jury is still out. Won't know until next week some time since I'm well past the point in my life where I'm willing to lay on the ground in sub-freezing weather to diagnose and fix my car. If it's the engine, well... maybe time for a big build to fix it.

 

Love the way you are squeezing those lemons into lemonade.

 

A seized engine That presents warnings over time, that he drove to the store and just stopped cranking? Doesn’t sound likely

 

Which would also be a cause for high amperage draw, which can be preliminarily easily tested by turning on headlights and then attempting to start engine while seeing if headlights dim.

Also, we built many engines in our engine rebuilding facility years back.

There were very few engines that were actually seized up via heat.

Mainly the Vega engines would come in seized up from excessive heat, and we would have to drive the pistons out with a hammer and a large drift placed over the plns.

So without a loss of oil pressure or any type of knocking sound before the engine stopped I seriously doubt your engine is seized.

 

I agree. I think I'd have noticed if the motor was having the kind of problem that'd cause it to seize. And I got a partial crank out of it when it died. Seized probably wouldn't have turned a little before locking up (at least, not without making a loud bang, or at least a loud clunk). But the starter motor is clearly drawing power and the motor isn't turning over, so seized cannot as yet be ruled out. Low probability but not zero based on what I know at the moment.

Part of me, truth be told, kind of hopes it's seized. It didn't happen when the engine was at speed, so any damage would be minimal. Nothing, say, $10-15K of massaging wouldn't fix. Now I have 345s on the back of the car, I could do with a bit more HP.

 

Yes. A seized motor would do that. But so would a Starter with a shorted winding. Thus, my two current theories - seized motor or a bad Starter.

 

I believe we posted a few seconds apart above… Lol
As I stated above; I seriously doubt your engines broke.

Is your car equipped with an auto or a manual transmission?

Happy holidays!

 

Manual. But it died in a spot I couldn't push it (I've had cars in the past, I'd look for a spot I could roll out of in case the battery died while it was parked. But not this time. Nooo. The spots were there, I just didn't take any of them). Also, I couldn't figure out how to get the e-brake to release, though I subsequently realized I needed to be on the brake pedal when I pushed the button. Duh. But I'd have had to push it up hill to get it to a spot I could jump start it, so it didn't matter. I considered having my buddy push it with his Silverado, but he flatly refused to do it (he used to have a nearly identical V as me, BTW). That's a true friend if you ask me. He knew I was pissed and also that it'd damage the car and he wouldn't let me do it because he knew I'd regret it later.

Him (front) and me (rear) at the track a few years ago. The silver Corvette you can barely see behind my car is the 02 Z06 w/Vortech blower that I owned for 18 years and had just sold to a third friend.

 

The Dodge was impossible to beat. Even with the Z06. The Z cornered much better but the power of the Hellcat was too much for it whenever the track was straight. Even with the weight difference, 550HP vs. 800-and-something. There is no substitute for power I guess. The Ferrari was not that hard to keep up with, but I think that was probably because I was a better driver. The Trackhawk Jeep was a joke. No one wanted to go around the track more than once in the damn thing. The only thing it'd really be good for on a track IMO is dragging a wreck back to the pits.