More on the Farmall 450 electrical problem

http://www.ytmag.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=farmall&th=812133

This is a follow-up to the question I raised about a melting battery terminal clamp on my father-in-law's Farmall 450, in the thread above. I printed the thread and took it to him, and then didn't see him for 2 days. In the meantime, he had no more luck getting it started.
I stopped by today, to see if he had done anything with either of his battery cables, which are both in rough shape, but he hadn't. He DID replace the one terminal.
Now, I'm not a farmer, (though I have a Super-A to pull a brush hog), and I'm mostly electronically illiterate. He was a lineman for the local power company, so he knows more than I do, and anyway, I need to be respectful when he gets his mind on something.

But I severely respect the collective knowledge here, and I'd like to ask again. Here's where things stand when I stopped by today...

First, I'm assuming this item that sits on his starter is a solenoid...



Well, with his old cables still in place, the starter-button produced a staccato clicking in this solenoid, this after he "put a full charge on the battery yesterday". It sounded like a mostly-dead battery, so I took the battery out of my car, and though it's woefully inadequate to crank the 450 engine, at least the clicking stopped and the starter became operational and tried to begin to crank. Now, however, smoke was coming from the terminals on the solenoid. (In the earlier post, smoke was coming from the battery box)
My FIL believes the solenoid has "shorted", even though as it smoked, the starter was moving.

So am I off to think his battery is toasted? And does this indicate he needs a solenoid besides?
Feel free to get mad if he didn't want to consider the battery cables, since that's where the original melting was occurring. Even today, I gently pointed out how lousy a shape I thought they were in, but he wants to try the new battery/solenoid combo first, and worry about the cables some other day.
I'd appreciate your thoughts.

The battery needs to be tested for amp productivity, but the issue is in connections. That Relay (often called a solenoid, but it is a relay in fact) is toast. it has high resistance internally and smokes as a result.
Trash it, and a new one is cheap. If the new one has 4 terminals use the S terminal for the wire to the button.
It needs new 0gauge or 00gauge battery cables made to fit (welding cable is great, car cables are not allowed.)
It will crank like a deamon with these mods. Jim

That's not an original solenoid for a 450 Diesel. Don't know about a 450 gas. I would guess that either the starter has a short or the solenoid is too light of duty.
The battery is also suspect.

Right on Jim!

My only additional comment to Pete is a car battery is NOT "woefully inadequate to crank a 450 engine". Rather, a standard car battery will spin a 450 very smartly.

Brownie, it is a gas engine.

My car battery was from my Kia Sportage, and is maybe 2" shorter and 3" less wide than his original battery. It looked almost lost, sitting in his battery box. But, it made the starter try to turn the engine over.

I"ll take the battery to the local auto parts store and get it tested under load in the morning, and also pick up a new relay.

I don"t know why he"s reluctant to make the cable replacement. His are beat. I"ll try to find some of them too, and maybe I"ll just do it when he isn"t looking.

That starter is dragging, causing the solinoid to get hot from too much amperage. If you put the booster cable on the starter side of the solinoid, then ground the other cable(make sure is is out of gear) it should spin with a car battery, if you have good heavy cables. If it doesn't turn fast, rebuild the starter, mainly the bushings.

That starter magnetic switch is a 6 volt as used on a gasoline engine. Every thing has to be in good shape for a 450 gas to crank on that 6 volt system.

If you know how to use a volt meter you can find the problems instead of just throwing parts at it. With the starter engaged there should be no more than .1 volt drop in any wire, .2 volt drop through any connection, but no more than about .5 volts drop from the battery post to the starter terminal. Also check the grounded side. You should have no more than about .2 volt drop between the starter and the battery post. Battery voltage during cranking should not drop below 9 volts. Starter amperage draw can be determined by reading the battery voltage during cranking and then have the battery load tested to the same voltage and read the amperage.