05 yukon won't start

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Titustitanium

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I need some help my 05 yukon 5.3l won't start it just clicks one loud click. It started with leaving the dome light on one night and the battery dying. I bought a new battery and cleaned the cables, truck wouldn't start bought a new starter still no luck (i even took it back and maid the parts store give me another one thinking I got a bad refinished one). Then bought a new ignition switch and relay and you guessed it still won't start. I have checked the grounds and they appear to be clean and in good condition. When I try using a screw driver to jump the starter it still just clicks once. The positive cable from the battery to the starter looks fine. I'm at a loss and need some help.
 

bottomline2000

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What weird is my truck cuts power after about 11 minutes if I leave any lights on. You have the same symptoms a friend of mine had with his ford truck. Turns out he blew a head gasket and a couple of cylinders were filling with coolant and hydrolocking the engine. Hopefully not your problem, but pull the plugs and see if you get a blast of fluid out the cyclinders when it turns over.

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ScottyBoy

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If you know for SURE that the cables, ground points, starter, and battery are all good and the battery has a full 12 volts, then its possible you do have engine damage like suggested above. My mother had the same exact symptoms on her Chevy Astro Van when she blew the engine. She ran it low on oil and the engine seized up. She thought the starter was bad since it would do one loud click, actually it was more of a clank. You could clearly hear the starter engaging against the flex plate and then nothing after that.
I had a friend help me diagnose the bad engine by putting removing the belt and putting a wrench on the crank pulley and trying to manually turn the engine. The engine did not turn no matter how hard we tried. We even put a 1/2" breaker bar on it and strained like hell and it would NOT budge. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but if your engine crank doesn't turn even with a breaker bar, then you need a new engine. It should turn over with minimal resistance.
 

bottomline2000

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Pull the plugs first and try what Scottyboy suggested. A blown head gasket can be fixed. No sense in causing more damage.

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retiredsparky

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The breaker bar and socket on the crank pulley may be quicker to determine if there is a bind. Another (unlikely) cause of binding is failure of the vibration dampener which resides behind the main crankshaft pulley.

I do agree that the most likely cause is hydrolocked engine. It only takes one cylinder with a small amount of coolant to lock up the engine.
 

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