Starter Relays for Dummies

A typical starter motor circuit

Self-appointed freelance experts: you gotta love 'em. Well, at least you love 'em if you're the Antisocial Network and you think it's fun to expose their dumbassery to the world. Take, for instance, "professional cook, baker and writer" Amrita Chuasiriporn, who somehow convinced herself (and eHow.com) that those degrees in Spanish and culinary arts qualified her to inform her readers about automotive electrical systems, beginning with her laughable discussion of "What Is a Starter Relay?" at ItStillRuns.com.

What, indeed? Well, as Chuasiriporn tells us in her introductory paragraph,

"When you get into and start your vehicle, a small series of processes takes place before your engine turns over and starts. At the heart of this process is your starter relay--if you have one."

Of course, she never explains that teaser line, "...if you have one," but we will: a car with a conventional internal combustion engine has a starter solenoid and/or a starter relay. They perform similar functions: the relay closes an electrical circuit that shunts additional current from the battery to the starter motor, the solenoid is a mechanical device that engages the starter motor with the flywheel. Either of them allows the battery to turn over the engine by turning the flywheel. Amrita, however, never says that because, we suspect, she didn't understand the detailed description she found at a pretty authoritative website. Instead, Chuasiriporn "explains" that

"A starter relay acts as an electrical circuit completer or circuit breaker in between the vehicle's battery and the starter motor. It helps to boost the battery's current so that not as great a current is required at ignition. The starter relay is sometimes, but not always, used in addition to a starter solenoid... When you activate your ignition switch, it sends an electrical current through the starter solenoid and starter relay to the starter motor, which then starts your vehicle's engine." Ummm, sort of; but inherent in the definition of a "relay" is how it works, which Amrita doesn't bother to mention. There's always a trickle of current through the starter motor, but closing the starter relay sends the bulk of the battery's current to the starter.

Chuasiriporn didn't talk about that. Instead, to pad her post to the site-mandated minimum word count, she babbled a while about the neutral safety switch, explaining that the switch...

"...is wired to the starter relay or solenoid and disallows the current from getting from the relay to the starter motor if your vehicle is not in... 'Neutral' (for manual vehicles)..."

...which, those of us who've actually driven a manual transmission, recognize as bull: instead of having to be in neutral, the clutch must be depressed. Go ahead and look: there's a little tab on the clutch pedal that engages a switch...

No, Amrita, you can't bake a starter relay (or a starter solenoid). And, apparently, despite your cooking and Spanish degrees, you can't write about one, either. Describing the starter relay as little more than "an electrical thingy" is just about all we needed to crown you our Dumbass of the Day.

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