My starter will at times not engage the fly wheel. sometimes it takes 4 or 5 tries to get the starter to engage the flywheel and turn the motor over. The starter always spins.....but does not always engage the flywheel. I hear the whirrr of the starter motor but the engine does not turn over.

I have read that there needs to be grease on the (bendix) shaft so the starter gear can slide smoothly in and out of the flywheel.

Can anyone tell me if this is the shaft that is suppose to have grease? (note the absence of grease)

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Chips

I have it on good authority that you DO NOT GREASE this gear. A dry lubricant is fine but nothing is better. He told me there was most likely a burr on the assembly that was causing it to hang.

mine did this right before going bad, within a few months of the first issue