The test rig pushed the red button 111,000 times and then the Ignitor stopped snapping. On disassembly I found a broken spring.

Above you can see the parts that make up the ignitor. The broken spring is in the middle, in two pieces.

I think that maybe the small, broken spring was receiving a small arc (electric) and was eroded away. The mechanism is the same as a Starrett auto-center punch. The strong spring, on the left, is compressed by finger pressure, while the hammer, dead center in the pic is resting on a "shelf", when the red shovel thingy to the left reaches the hammer and shoves it off of the shelf, wham!, the hammer is propelled toward the crystal, at the same time compressing the now broken spring. The hammer hits the crystal, and the small spring returns the hammer to the "shelf".

I stretched the broken spring and re-assembled the ignitor. The ignitor still works, and still fires the spark plug.

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