Loosing dash lights and power temporarily

[Bristol_Jer]

Got a strange issue with my car at the moment. All the normal dash lights come on when ignition turned on, then when you turn the key to start the car a loud click from under the bonnet is heard and all the dash lights disappear. Turn ignition back on and nothing, no dash lights and nothing when you try to start the engine. Leave the car for a few minutes, try ignition again and it works and starts up fine most of the time, occasionally it plays up again.

Would this sound like ignition switch playing up? Another thought I had was that I have a battery isolator switch on the main feed from the battery, could this be failing under load?

I've checked all the terminals and earth points, and all tight, battery is charged ok as the starter spins over fine when the ignition lights do come on and everything works as it should.

I'm putting the battery on charge just incase, and will bypass the isolator just incase once I put it all back together, although it has only been used a handful of times so would have thought it should be ok

Just wondering if anyone had an idea what this could be or if they've had this problem before? Thanks

[zd3bx]

Symptoms you describe sound like battery related, but it's weird how it starts afterwards...So indeed, it could be the battery isolator switch.

[HairyScreech]

Those isolator switches are buggers, check that out first as we had problems with them on the F4 car.