My starter drive gear thrust forward and engages the
flywheel but
  fails to
  turn over the engine. Any of you more mechanically
inclined guys have a
  guess as to what my problem may be? (It's a rebuilt
starter)

  Jay


  Can you turn the engine over by hands on the ring
gear?
  One rotor could be one tooth off on the phasing
gear.
  Make sure the right spark plugs are in there.

  Put a  voltmeter on the brush connections.
  If the starter wire is too small too much voltage
  will drop across the wire.

  Send a sketch of the wire sizes and a schematic on
how
  it is wired.

  Paul Lamar

Hi  Jay, Make sure that the starter Bendix drive is
correct and not
running out of travel before the solenoid contacts meet.
(remove
starter, clamp starter and put a piece of pine packing
crate onto gear
and engage starter should smoke the wood on the gear), no
matter how
hard you try to stop it, ie you will not stop the gear, all
the above
assumes that the engine will turn over.
  John Burey


Thanks for all the responses gentlemen. I attached a
diagram representative
of how I have mine wired. So far I tried putting a volt
meter on the
solenoid terminals. With the battery on there is 12+ volts
but with the
starter button pushed there is less than one volt at the
solenoid. I'm using
8 gauge wires and they're getting hot rather quickly.

...Oh and I can turn the engine by hand.

Jay



What is the current rating on the solenoids? As much as 300
amps
can flow through a main starter cable. Starter motors are
around
3 HP (for a short while). 3 HP is 2.300 KW.  2300/12 V
= 190 amps.

Paul Lamar

With that much voltage drop with the starter actuated, you
have a DEAD SHORT in the starter.

Joel