Ignition Problems?

[Sarstan]

For starters, my car is an '82 Celica GT. My father while he still had the car had trouble one day starting the car. He would turn the key and all the lights would come on and all, but the car would not turn over no matter how far he turned. To fix this, he ran a wire from the starter and one from the battery to next to the steering wheel and would have to put the key into the ignition and touch the wires to make the car start.
So there's the situation and the problem is I don't care much for touching two wires together after all these years to start my car. I just replaced the ignition switch wire that runs from behind the ignition to under the dash and it didn't help matters. Anyone have any ideas on this?
Thanks in advance.

[stepho]

Probably the key switch is worn out inside (this happened to my '87 Honda).
Replace.
It is also possible for the problem to be one of the old wires being broken inside (plastic sheath okay but metal wire is snapped).
Buy a copy of the Haynes or Chilton manuals, study the wiring diagrams and then start probing with a multimeter or light probe (light bulb and pair of wires connect to ground and the item of interest).

Test each connection on the key switch while turning the key through all positions.
This will give you a feel for what should be happening.

Also check the fuse panel.
Sometimes the connections are loose underneath.

- Stepho

[Pineapple]

Or simply a broken relay.

[rocketracing]

My bet is on the relay but there also could ahve been a short somewhere and that would have fried the fuseable link by the starter.