My starter button has failed intermittently for the last couple thousand miles, leaving me in the awkward situation of praying a Harely owner would not ride by and witness me push starting my Honda. So this time it failed in my garage, and with no need to bump start it to get it home I decided to do take it apart and clean it up as described and illustrated by Rattlebars in Shop Talk.
The switch contacts were so corroded I figured this had to be the problem, so with a scotchbright pad scrubbed them until they were shiny, pulled the shunt, stretched the shunt spring, put it back together, hit the starter button and nothing.
Discouraged but not defeated I unscrewed the kill switch from the housing, pulled it apart and looked it over. The contacts looked like new (sorry no picture). So I pulled the shunt, cleaned it up, stretched the shunt spring put it back together hit the button and bam! it fired right up.
Near as I can figure that little spring had lost shape after 16 years and just needed a little stretching.
Thought I'd share my experience in hopes it can help someone else.
