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[JTBob]

I tried to start my 1992 SPi Mini, but it had zero response when turning the key. I thought maybe the battery had died, but I still had the interior light and the headlights worked.

So then I thought maybe it was just really low, so I tried jumper cables. No change. Checked all the fuses. All were still good. I then checked the cables along the base of the steering column to see if any wires were broken. All looked good. Tried the key again and the Mini started right up and ran perfectly.

I'm guessing when I was moving those wires around, I may have reset a connection. I'm going to look more closely at the entire length of the cable bundles coming from the ignition switch. Is there any area I should really take a close look at? Something that is a known problem spot?

Before all that, I had replaced the entire exhaust system (Maniflow LCB), plus new O2 sensor. When everything was back in place, it started up, but ran with a lopy idle, like I had put in a high lift cam. And there was quite a bit of smoke from the exhaust which smelled rather rich. After running it around for a while, the situation hadn't changed. Looked at everything I had touched and it was the short vacuum line from the intake manifold to the vapor trap. One end of the line had come out of the rubber elbow. Reseated the line and engine ran great. So I'm not sure if any of that work had done anything to the ignition circuitry.

Thanks for any help,
Robert