Hi. I'm Mike from 1A Auto. We've been selling auto parts for over 30 years.
Hey, everyone. Sue here from 1A Auto and today we have a 2013 Camry in the shop and I'm going to show you how to replace the starter. If you need this part or any other part for your car, click on the link below and head on over to 1aauto.com.
First thing we're going to do ,like always, is disconnect that negative battery cable. 10 millimeter wrench or socket, and we're just going to loosen that up and move that aside. Now, the location of the starter is right down here on top of the transmission where it meets the engine. It's kind of right underneath the air box area in the air dam. We're going to take this all apart and get right to that starter.
First thing we have to do is take all seven body clips in this plastic shroud cover all the way over, and how you do it on this Toyota is very simple. Push down. You hear that click and then the whole thing will pop right up.
To reinstall it, see how the pin goes out. I just like to grab 'em, push 'em up like that, and then you'll push it back in and push it flush. To take 'em out, push it down, lift it up, and push it down. Then you can lift it up. Go all the way over, all seven. Take that and get that out of the way.
I'm going to take the air box out and the air dam feeder. I'm going to leave the air box top attached to the bottom. Let's do it as easy as possible. First thing is take this hose right off and then 10 millimeter, take the clamp off at the throttle body. There's three, I think, bolts holding this whole housing down, and it's going to be a 10 millimeter socket: one here and one way down here.
All right, so we have to take the top off, so we did under the throttle body. Take that vacuum hose off. We're going to take the map sensor, disconnect that, push down that tab, it's kind of a stiff tab. I don't want to break it. With a little screwdriver, pop that right out of the way. Take the clips and the vacuum lines--we've got one over here on the engine side, two in the front, and one with a white line on it that goes to the left side. Now we can lift that cover up.
We're going to have to unplug the mass airflow sensor harness from the lid right there. I'm going to get a little pair of pliers and take that out of there. Okay, now we can lift that right up.
Now I'm going to lift the air filter out of the way. See what's holding this down. We're going to take this vacuum line off that, and I want to take the harness off of the air box. There you go. Now I think it's just going to be rubber bushings, so I'm going to grab this thing real firmly and pull up. And it worked. We have a solenoid up front here and the clip is down below, I can feel it. Slide that off.
Now, do I want to take this front air dam off? I am going to for visuals, so we can see better. With a 10 millimeter socket, I'm going to take these off. Take this up. That's perfect. You can just rest that aside. Now we can see the whole starter and the bolts that we need to get to.
I'm going to peel back the boot on the positive cable that goes to that starter, and if it's the factory starter, that's a 12 millimeter wrench or socket. Break that free. You make sure that that negative cable is undone because if this positive cable wire touches anything, if that battery is attached, you can short and blow a lot of modules. I always do that for safety. I put the boot back over it.
Now, on the solenoid wire, I'm going to push down on the tab and pull it out. Then there's two mounting screws that mount this starter to the actual engine block, there's one here and one there and it's a 14 millimeter socket. I like to break 'em both free before I back one of 'em all the way out. It's nice enough that you can just use your hands after you break 'em free. Get that top bolt and the bottom. Now I'm just going to grab that starter and wiggle it and there it is.
Here we have our brand new starter we just got from 1A Auto, and here we have the Toyota factory one we just took out of our 2013 Camry. Match 'em up. They're identical, same size, mounting holes, solenoids, same connector, that's nice. Ours comes with a new bolt and it is a 12 millimeter socket, same as the factory one. The actuator is the same size in diameter and has the same teeth, obviously. If you need this part or any other part for your car, click on the link below and head on over to 1aauto.com.
Here we have the old starter that we took out, and we're just going to give it a quick exam and make sure that everything inside the housing is working properly. When you take your old starter out, sometimes you're not going to be able to understand why it failed, because it's going to be inside the solenoid or inside the winding of the motor. You might not visually see it. A lot of times this ground wire gets corroded and breaks off, unfortunately that is part of the motor itself, so you need to replace the whole starter or the solenoid will go bad internally.
If you have a grinding noise, like something is metal to metal, you always want to check your gear teeth here and make sure there's none that are shiny, real shiny and scratched up. If they are, then you want to make sure that your flywheel is in good shape. Examine that flywheel before you put a new starter in, because no matter where you get that starter from, it's not going to last long. One because the flywheel is damaged and two, you're going to void any warranty. Just give it a quick visual, this was electronic died, that's why it's not working. It wasn't actually a sound or a metal grind.
Take our new starter, I'll just bring it down. Line it up with that starter hole in the tranny and just wiggle it until you can find it centered out. I'm going to hand start the two starter bolts first and make sure they're centered properly. I'm going to snug it down and then I'm going to get the torque specs torqued out to the manufactures' specs.
The specs for the starter: Two bolts for the mounting bolts is 27 foot pounds. It's kind of a hard place to get in the back here, you need a little extension. There we go.
Now we're going to install that solenoid wire. Always check conditions and make sure there's no burnt marks and that nothing's been melted. Looks great, so we're just going to click it in. Then we have the battery cable. Take this bolt off. It's nice because it has that floating washer in it, just like the factory, and it is a 12 millimeter. Factory size is perfect. You don't want to rank on it. That is copper stud, and it will pull right through that housing or stripper snap. Once it's firm, that's really all you need to do. Make sure your boot is back on and we're ready to reassemble the air box.
Now, these two kind of go together and that's kind of a tight fit in there. I'm going to just slide that in like that and bring that down. You've got this arm dam down here. You're going to make sure you center that. Put that in--you see it right there. My mounting bolts seem to line up, so does this.
Before I tighten anything, I want to get my vacuum lines back in place. Just going to start 'em by hand and then I'm going to get the air box bolts and going to start those by hand. I already snapped down that back bushing to stop this from moving around too much. I'm going to tighten this down, so I don't want it to move anymore. I'm going to hold it right into place, nice and snug there. Tighten that bolt and tighten this one. Tighten the top front. I'm going to go alongside here and put my hose in.
I have attachment back here for the mass airflow sensor harness. Put our air filter in. Grab the top of our air box. I like to line up the throttle body first before I do anything. Make sure my vacuum lines are out of the way. You got those two prongs on the back here, so you're going to tilt it at an angle and slide those in. Now it sits nice and flush. Lift up your clamps.
First thing I'm going to do so I don't forget is put my mass airflow sensor harness back on and connect that. The one with the ring on it goes to the left, and I have one more over here. Put my vent hose in and tighten that up. That's a 10 millimeter socket and you want to make sure a 100% that that's sitting down flush on that throttle body. You can also use a Phillips screwdriver. Toyota's nice enough to have that option. You want to make sure that's tight, no air leaks. You'll throw a code from the mass airflow sensor. Perfect. Nice and snug. All's we got to do is connect that negative battery, and we'll give it a shot. Be sure that's down tight. 10 millimeter wrench. Start her up.
Put our radiator front shroud cover back on. You get the three little fingers that are going to go right into that hole. Push it down flush. Don't push it down all the way.
Thanks for watching. Visit us at 1aauto.com for quality auto parts, fast and free shipping and the best customer service in the industry.