i am having a few troubles with my ute atm.

i can crank the car over and it will no fire until i let the key go. otherwise i can just keep cranking all day and it wont fire...

i have checked the points, new rotor, new cap, new leads, new plugs, new ballast resistor....

any ideas?

perhaps the starter motor is sucking all the power and only when it stops there's enough spark to fire? Really i dont know...

yeh i think your on the right path cause it makes sense, maybe i will run some new leads to the starter motor and clean up the main earth etc.

just want someone to say they had the same troubles so i can pin point it

Could also be the ignition its self and check the wiring to starter and the main plug under dash with ignition wire in it. Have had similar probs in the past was a bad connection in the main plug the ignition wire wasn't making sufficient contact.

The answer i'm thinking will be in your fuse box...check for blown eng cont fuse

your ig coil gets power thru switch, one wire when cranking 12v,when running 10v thru resister to coil.u are not getting power to coil on crank. check wiring from coil to ig switch. think it is black wire with red trace/crank wire.black wire with white trace/run wire to resister block, then to coil.
make shore u have power out of back of switch on terminal with black with red trace
wire any probs give me a ring.
tommo 0411797234

Tommo is right, the coil resistor wire is the most common cause of this. Pull it off, push it back on. They are slip-fit and tend to get corroded after 15-20 years.

I've had 1200 ignition switches that overrun the contacts. An example of this happens for the switch positions that need to contact both start and ignition at the same time.

Your problem sounds like while it's cranking, the non-resistor wire is not getting 12v. Black/Red. When you let off the starter, the coil charges via the resistor supplied Black/White wire.

You'll need to remove the ignition switch from the steering lock with a phillips head screwdriver.

Using a multimeter with blackwire grounded to body, you can test my theory that black/red is not getting 12v during crank.

ps. just read the rest ofthe thread. Tommo had it right

pps. I've also seen ignition switches behave if you turn it too far, the starter motor won't turn.