starting problems?

my son calls me and says the taco won't turn over. i drive a hour to his location and he has broken the battery hardware off trying to tighten it. went and brought a battery and hardware connections. still no go. i rent a car hauler and get it home. i go to start working on it this morning, hit the key and she fires right up. its a 02 4dr /w 260k on her. this is only mechanical problems i've had with it. i'm thinking the brushes in the solenoid are warn and need to replace the whole starter. the only other thing i can think of is the starter fuse in the engine compartment. anyone care to offer there opinion? thanks guys!

 

ended up replacing starter, found a rebuilt one w/ lifetime warranty from advanced auto. price was 89.00. it also was a cold weather starter, not sure what that means. seeing how i live in michigan, figure i best get it. so far so good, starts up now. son told me before he would hit the key and nothing, not even a click. he said a few attempts it would turn over. guess it was the soleniod.

 

Yea, it was the starter then... You can tap on the starter while someone is turning the key and it will usually fire up

 

I had a starting problem also, but at 68k. It would just crank till you could hear the flywheel grind. Got whole starter replaced.

 

i guess its irrelevant now but there are two contacts in the starter which commonly go bad, and can be replaced easily, and cheap cheap. ive done it a few times and its always worked.

 

thanks cory, that info could help someone down the road. could you post the fix? the truck has 260k on her, i have gotten my money worth out of it. i have 3 toyota's, all of them have high mileage and still run great. well i should say 2, the 3rd one the ex wife is driving.