[Rich Lambert]

UPDATE:

Well, it happened again this morning on the way to work (at four freakin thirty in the morning) - popping, banging, and dying. I had to push the car about 300 yds to the end of the driveway, leave it there, and take another car to work. It was the perfect start to a day that sucked all the way around.

So I call my buddy Skip today to share my misery and he, and others on this thread, said to look at the ignition system. I was convinced that the intermittent-ness of the problem pointed to a fuel issue, probably blockage in the tank outlet filter.

This afternoon, after jump-starting the car and getting it back into the garage, I decided to look at ignition system. I started at the end and was going to work my way forward. All the plug wires were seated in both the plugs and the cap. The cap inside contacts looked pretty black and the end of the rotor didn't look too happy either, so I took them off and Dremmel wire brushed the cap contacts and replaced the rotor. Before I put them on I checked the points and they were black too. I checked the point gap and there wasn't any...nada. It looks like the plastic piece of the points that rides on the distributor shaft had worn down so far the points weren't opening at all. I took the points off, gave 'em a sanding, put them back in, and gapped them and...it runs like a fricken champ. I guess you have to lube the distributor shaft more than once...when you put the engine in the car. Fortunately, I have a lifetime supply of distributor lube (one tube).

I really hope this is the end of this problem. Anybody know the suggested distributor shaft lube interval?

One more thing...my loopy tach quit bouncing around and reads steady RPM's now...something to do with points not opening? That alone made up for the crappy day I had.