This must be a very common problem. Mine did it about the second time I used it. Here's how to fix it. Drill a new hole in the black plastic piece that the wound spring sticks into. If you look I bet the original hole is deformed and worn. I drilled a new hole 180 degrees from the original. That worked for a year. Until last week. I now have drilled a third hole 90 degrees from the other two. I've noticed that I have this problem whenever I pull the starter rope all the way out. By using shorter pulls it doesn't try and bend the coil spring. I found this post while searching for a new "starter wheel" the black piece. I found it on another site for $4.00 so I'm thinking the best fix is to just buy a new starter wheel and spring.
Gary Johnson, August 2009