Mick:
That's fine, as long as you splice into the coil wires of the relay and not bypass the relay altogether and splice into the load side. If you do, there is going to be mondo amperage going through that switch and there's no switch I can think of off hand that will handle such a load, even for a few seconds.
Is there no one near where you live that can give you a hand? If you were local here, I would have no problems inviting you over to the shop and giving you a hand. I think that if you think it's a bad relay, then manually supplying current to the coil through a switch wouldn't necessarily solve your problem. Maybe see if Greg has a proper relay to sell you and give that a try first?
I fell your frustration man, hang in there.
