tkoppab

Alright i really need some help here guys. First let me tell you the stats on the car first.

Its a 66 coupe, with a 289, long tube hooker headers, edelbrock performer intake, edelbrock 4 barrel carb. Auto. power brakes and steering. Hmm.. i think that might be the only stuff needed for now

alright heres the problem.

The other day i was driving, as soon as i got off the freeway and the rpms went down, the car just completely shut off on me, just for no reason. So i threw it into neutral and after a bunch of tries it fires up again, but i had to pretty much keep reeving it just to keep it going. i was holding the brake and reeving at the same time so it wouldnt shut off, cause when i did, it didnt want to turn on anymore. So i after a huge struggle to keep the car on, i get home. pull up into my drive way and the car of course shuts off. So i get to checking whats wrong.

I replaced a few rubber nipples that were making the vacuum be all screwed up and put a new pvc and hose to the carb because it wasnt secure. That and i noticed that the header is leakign a bit of air and is putting. After i fixed the stuff, same thing happened again, and was a pain in the *** getting home.

Sooo.... here i stand not having any idea why the car cant stay on, and it sounds horrible when running, not a nice low rumble like it does when running normally. sounds kinda forced.

I know remember the night it started acting up, I had to go up a really steep driveway and the headers bottomed out really bad. im pretty sure that affected it. but here i stand not knowing what to do next and am pissed so didnt bother lookign at the car when i got home tonight.

I would grealy appreciate some help, i know it can be a bunch of different things but im up to looking around and trying to figure it out with you guys. Thanks.

jlp66stang

Check your points! Mine closed up the other day and reving it up and throwing it in gear was the only way it would run. At high rpms the points open up more because of slack. Could be it!

tkoppab

You know what i think you might be right, i havent driven it in a while so that might be it. i'll have to check. any other ideas.?

jlp66stang

After that, check power to the coil, spark plugs, fuel filter, trash in carb. Eliminate one thing at a time and you will track it down.

ninteen66mustang

Ya, the points caused me lots of problems. Check all the simple stuff first, as jlp66stang said.

sanjosebass

I just installed an Pertronix Electronic Ignition on a 65 I am restoring (almost the same setup you have - 289 Edelbrock Carb & manifold, Auto) and it was night and day. I went from an engine that was struggling to an engine that sounded perfect.

After taking on this project I learned that you have to take it step by step. Start with the cheap stuff first and gradually make your way to the expensive stuff.

Good luck!

Marcelino

JMD

Kinda covered aready, but when I read your post the first thing that came to my mind was a bad coil. As stated, it could be points as well.

If I were in this position I would buy a cheapo coil to troubleshoot the car with.

Check your fuel filter also, could be plugging and then unplugging a little when the fuelflow drops off upon the engine dying out. This might explain why the engine re-fires after going dead.

flyingfool

ignitionis my suspicion...easy to check too. pertronix is great btw. if its you points, might as well upgrade to newer technology

tkoppab

well update, been busy as hell so didnt have time till today to check out my car, i changed the points and bam! it worked, i was glad it was such a simple fix. i am planning to upgrade the ignition to electronic like you guys said, but havent had a chance to do it yet before this problem even happened. but for now it was a easy and not so expensive fix so i just changed. so far its doing ok. I havent driven it even enough to really test it enough. but i felt the power return and feels better. Only had one thing that happened but wasnt sure, so if it does it again i'll let you guys now, but for now im good, thanks for the help.

390bigblock1

before you spend a ton of money fixing anything, you said you hadn't driven it for a while, could just be bad gas then? thats what happened to me hadnt started it for about a month and it was acting up like what your talking about and i put new gas in it, then she was running like she shouldve been