I have about a 30 year old MTD snowblower (Tecumseh HM100) with no spark getting to the plug (in past year's I've forgotten to turn the key...duh). The ignition key has one wire going down and joining up to a connector with two other wires..and they disappear under the cover. The key switch has a lot of play at the wire connection, however the contact looks real good. Before I go tearing the cover off, is there a way I can bypass the ignition switch? Does it actually allow me to 'start' the engine, or does it just 'kill' the power when I want it off (because I can always stop the engine by just reducing the throttle all the way).
Vic

The kill switch actually shorts the primary winding of the coil to ground to stop spark at the plug. If you want to bypass the switch for testing, just disconnect the wire from the key switch and check for spark. If you get the engine started with the wire off the switch, just touch and hold it to any metal part of the engine, this will short to ground out the ignition coil and shut the engine off.