[Licensed to kill]

Originally Posted by Synchro909

It's not an uncommon thing.
FWIW, I recall many years ago, being impressed with the cleverness of the designers when a friend and I worked out what they had done to avoid the starter drag causing hard starting. They basically had two ignition systems, one worked on a low voltage - probably 50-60% of the battery voltage. It was this circuit that provided the spark when the starter was engaged and when the motor started, it switched back to the main circuit. Starting had always been easy but that suddenly changed which caused us to delve into the system. The problem was something else - I don't remember what now, only what a genius system it was. I don't even remember which car this was, we had so many between us and we always helped each other when there was any issue.

On the truck in question, the owners brother, who is an absolute WHIZ, shade tree mechanic, had put a switch in the truck that bypassed the starting system and provided full power to the coil on start up to avoid this exact situation. Unfortunately, Bert had given this truck to one of his grandsons and his son inlaw removed the bypass system. Then the grandson decided that the truck was too slow and gave it back.