I feel like I should know the answer to this question, and I'm a little embarassed to ask, but why are there two solenoids on the starting system?

 

the one on the fender sends a signal to the starter while the one on the starter pushes the gear out so it hits the flywheel/ flex plate.

 

Generally a solenoid mounted on the starter motor itself to engage the starter gear to the ring gear on the flywheel, and a remote mounted heavyduty relay,sometimes called a solenoid, to supply electricity to the motor.

 

my battery cable goes straight to the starter. there is a smaller wire that goes from the battery to the relay on the fender then to the starter to send the signal.

 

Not thread jacking but since this is about starters i would like to share a experiance i had with mine. The truck would start hard all the time and eventuly the truck would not start and the starter would just spin so i though the starter was shot but it turned out to be the starter bolts were really loose and the starter was not lined up with the teeth on the flywheel so i just tightened them and it fixed it

 

Lucky the ring gear on the flywheel or flexplate didn't get damaged too bad.

 

i've had the hapen. i had to replace the flex plate shortly after that. but that was because some how the holes for the TC got stretched back and it was crooked.

 

I inspected the flywheel ring gear and it looked fine, all the teeth were intact and looked great. It was a reaL hassle because it happend when i was in a store parking so i went under there and thats when i noticed the starter loose but you can tell when its getting loose. It makes a pretty good banging sound.