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I'm hoping to get some sort of heads up before I take it to a mechanic, but here's the story with my 94 Dodge Caravan 6 cyl 3.3L:

I try to start my car, but the battery is dead. I hadn't left the lights on or anything, so I figure its a bad battery. I get the car jumped, and it runs perfectly. I shut the car off. I turn the key to start it again (about a minute after turning the car off) and its just as dead as it was before I had gotten it jumped.

So I buy a new battery, get it jumped (its late at night, I couldn't see to put the battery in right there), take it home. Runs perfect all the way home. I turn it off, try to start it again for the heck of it, same problem. So once daylight comes, I go out, install the new battery, turn the key. Car seems like the battery is dead. I scratch my head, hook jumper cables from my old batter that I just replaced, to the new battery. Car starts, and runs just fine. Turn it off, same exact problem as the other times.

So in my head, I can rule out the battery (if the bad one was good enough to jump the "good" one, it wasn't really bad in the first place...), I can rule out the starter (car starts just fine once you get another battery hooked up to it), and I can rule out the alternator (once car gets started, it has no problem whatsoever staying running). So does anyone have ANY IDEA what this could possibly be. Strangest car problem I've ever had in my entire life.

Thanks so much.
 

'95 Voyager 3.0L 99K miles. I'd look at the starter solenoid. Sounds like the starter needs more cranking amps than normal to get moving.  

no no no the cables would be the first thing i would at   ??? do u have lite when thee car wont start ?? clean the post and the cables ///the batt got power right so its just not getting to the motor   ground wire or the pos/  check  ./// move the wires at the batt when someone trys to start and when it starts  then there it is //check both ends of the cables  

tommy m wrote:

no no no the cables would be the first thing i would at ??? do u have lite when thee car wont start ?? clean the post and the cables ///the batt got power right so its just not getting to the motor ground wire or the pos/ check ./// move the wires at the batt when someone trys to start and when it starts then there it is //check both ends of the cables

It turned out to be the wire I had running from my battery to run the amps for my audio system (that actually doesn't exist anymore at the moment since my amp blew, so its not actually hooked up to anything). As soon as I removed that wire, everything was back to normal. The funny thing is, the wire had been there and nothing changed for about 3 months, so I don't know why it just all of a sudden decided to cause a problem. I don't imagine it was causing a short since I have a fuse on the cable 6 inches from where it connects to the battery that didn't blow. And all of my other fuses were fine too. So I don't know. But thank you guys for your help.
 

thank you for getting back to us    its nice what was wrong   it helps all of us  that r trying to help   thany you again  

tommy m wrote:

thank you for getting back to us its nice to kno what was wrong- it helps all of us that r trying to help- thank you again

Custom, thanks for posting the outcome: it's a rarity in automotive.com forums.

No problem guys. Thanks for your suggestions. I figured I owed it to your forum to follow up, considering you're trying to help me and asking nothing in return. And if someone has the problem in the future, I figured it would help to give another possible solution to the problem. Thanks again.