wires on starter cleaned/sanded BUT what order to they go on, 1974 914 1.8 Options

[brcacti]

Hello, my intermittent starting has gone to NO STARTING, does it matter what order the wires go back on the starter solenoid? I took them off to clean but not sure what order they went on.

[Spoke]

The only way to debug something like this is to take voltage measurements at different points.

There aren't many wires on the starter. A small yellow wire from the ignition switch and a very heavy black or red wire going to the battery and a medium gauge wire coming from the alternator. That wire goes with the heavy wire.

When you say "not starting" you really mean "not cranking". Not starting means the engine is cranking but doesn't fire up.

I assume you mean not cranking. The starter circuit is very simple. The ignition switch provides power to the bendix (yellow wire), the bendix pushes the starter gear into the flywheel and completes the circuit to start the starter spinning. One time my starter bendix got gummed up and wouldn't push the gear into the flywheel and thus wouldn't start the starter spinning. I took the bendix apart and WD40'ed it and it's been fine ever since.

You need to check the voltage at the yellow wire at the starter when attempting to crank. Do this by adding a wire to the yellow wire on the starter as best you can and when starting, check the voltage at the wire. Adding the wire means you don't have to be under the car to check the voltage. I'm not a fan of being under the car when cranking the engine. You will likely need a 2nd person to do this. If you see a solid 12V at the wire, then the starter is the problem. If the voltage droops a lot, then it's either the ignition switch or battery terminals.

If the voltage at the yellow wire droops a lot, eliminate the battery terminal issues by turning on the headlights and see if they dim or go out when the ignition key is turned to start.