Hello - My 1981 Spider 2000 Automatic will not turn off when I turn the key in the ignition to off. I take the key out and it continues to run. I've checked the wiring and nothing seems to be melted or in bad shape. This just happened suddenly - one second it is fine and then it just happened. No modifications or replaced parts. The only way I know to turn it off is to disconnect the coil wire from the distributor.

Has anyone experienced this? Can anyone help point me in the right direction?

Thank you,
Phil

The problem is most likely to be at the ignition switch or it's connector. The connector is known to suffer from overheated contacts that can short wires together.

There should be two pink wires from the connector C31. One goes direct to the ignition coil, the other to fuse #1 in the fusebox. These two wires should only be live when the ignition is switched on.

If you disconnect the pink wire from the coil and remove fuse #1 and the pink wires are still live, it would suggest a fault in the ignition switch.

Here's a copy of the 1981 Spider ignition wiring diagram that may help.

Thank You Very Much Davren! I will take a look at it this weekend and let you know how it goes.

So if it is the ignition switch then I need to simply buy a new one?

Thanks again,
Phil

With some of the early Fiat ignition switches you could remove the black plastic contact block from the switch and replace or repair just the block.

If yours is removeable, it will be tricky to dismantle and repair. If you try it, be careful when separating the two halves of the block because the individual contacts are likely to fall out.