' let me try to draw you a pic. 302..holly 600...c4...pertronix mod.. car runs great..cranks on first fire ...the prob. is ..for a while it would only go 1/8 mile and shut off..switch off and restart and go another 1/8 mile. then it stopped doing that for a while, then yesterday i was getting into it and at about 80 mph it did it again...i put it in neutral..restarted it and went the 1/8 mile and had to do it again, untill i got home. as soon as i restart it, it takes off like nothing is wrong....i can fast idle it and it just keeps running...it doesn't matter what speed you drive, you go the same distance before it shut off... if it hadn't stopped doing it once before i would have thought something was broken. the turning it off and restarting it is what baffles me .you don't have to wait to do it..i restart it before it stops rolling... any ideas of what to check ...frank... p.s. ...i would like to make this terry's, fault if all possible...
Does'nt sound like a fuel problem. Sounds more electrical. Maybe bad coil as mentioned before. Also could be loose or corroded connection some where. Happy searching
I don't know if this will help but I will relate a story about a car I had.Back in 1979 I bought a beautiful 1976 Cougar,this car had it all.You could cruise at 70 mph all day and night in this thing.Had the 460 with a 4 barrel and power everything.As they say it would pass everything but a gas station.Anyway I needed a car that got better mileage so I gave it to my wife to drive.This car would die on her every time she took it out.I couldn't get it to die on me no matter what I did.Even though it would die,it would start right back up.I did everything to this car to try and find out the problem.My wife swore up and down it was posssessed. She finally refused to drive it.I started diving it,no problems.Then one Sat. I had to work and I couldn't find my keys so I grabbed hers.Away I went and sure enough about a mile away it died on me.What the? Started it up drove a few more miles and it died again.Thought about it at work all day,now the only thing that changed was the keys.She had this humongus key chain,took off the ignition key and drove home with no problems.What was happening was the key chain was actually turning the ignition switch off when it would swing.I still kid her about the possessed Cougar.She doesn't carry a key chain with all that goofy stuff on it anymore.I hate to think of the hours I wasted messing with that problem,althogh I knew that cars electrical system like the back of my hand.Some problems are just like that-they will drive you nuts.
I'd like to think it's pay-back for selling me a car and telling me about the sticking throttle after I had the problem (5 minutes after getting the car), turned off the engine, coasted to the side of the road, and called you from my cell phone. I believe your first words were, "Oh, yeah. I meant to tell you about that."
graybeard, that's not terrys', fault but something i will look into... . need to check the coil also..thanks ..frank...
I agree with Rick...sounds like a fuel problem I had once. Car would run great until I loaded it (like going up a hill or hitting the highway) and after a short while would suddenly nose dive and stall. Would start right up after I stoped it and run great...then would do the same thing a few min later. Turned out to be a clogged fuel filter(the screen filter the screws into a stock Ford carb). replace it and it was great for a few days..then it did it again. Learned not to run it too low on fuel as there was all kinds of stuff in the tank that would clog the filter.
Had a friend of mine tell me about a vehicle doing exactly that many moons ago. They threw every fuel related part they could find at it. After none of that worked they ended up dropping the tank and finding a peice of newspaper (or cloth, can't remember which) inside the tank. Best they could figure is they would start the car and drive it a bit until the material would get sucked up against the pickup and starve it, shutting it down. of course as soonas it shut off and there was no more suction from the pump, the bit of material would come off and allow fuel into the pickup again. Damndest thing, but makes sense.
