Drove my new (old) 1987 Corolla the 700km home from Sydney today. While it was running didn't miss a beat, stoked.
Stopped in for fuel and shut the engine off, when I went to start it again nothing, like nothing at all.
Turn the key one click, stereo comes on, next click, fan and gauges, next one to start the car, stereo, fan etc drop out and the starter does not engage (can't even here the bendix moving at all)
Interestingly also the cabin light dims, almost as if the starter motor is drawing a huge load and sucking all the juice from other parts of the car.
Anyway, call NRMA, they arrive half an hour later.
Test my battery, test comes back good, and was showing over 13+V
He went to the car, and started it straight away without any issue, kicked over first go
Oh how silly did I look and continued on my way.
When I got home tried to replicate it again, but it just kicked over basically straight away without issue.
Any suggestions on where to start looking? I really don't want to get caught out with this,
Basically have ruled out the alternator due to it only doing this when the car has been running for some time, car started perfectly at 4am this morning first kick so the battery is definitely being charged
Bad ground? Bad starter? Heat expansion making the starter work harder? Bad connection?