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440/6 Stall, No Restart

Buckeye440

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Hey all, took my '68 Satellite with swapped 440/6 out for a little spin last week. Shortly after leaving the driveway, it felt like it started to miss a little. I pulled into a parking lot, turned it off, waited a few minutes, and it restarted fine. Idles in the parking lot, in gear, for 20-25 minutes, occasionally coasting a few feet. Started to drive back home, started going up hill and the sputter came back. So I gave it some gas and the engine suddenly woke up and roared, sounded great. Got off the gas as I approached a stop light and started turning left. As I gave it gas out of the turn it didn't respond at all, zero acceleration. Within a few feet it shut off, in all honesty it felt like it ran out of gas but I had just filled the tank the day before. Luckily I had a few people push it to the house from the end of the street, again, incredibly lucky. No matter what we could not get it to start. It turns over like normal, the air cleaner came off and the center crab had gas coming out of the jets. A few days later went to check spark and it started on one crank. Baffled. Checked spark with a timing light and all 8 wires near the plugs showed RPM readings. ANY ideas why it randomly wanted to stall and not start??
 
Ballast resistor?
Intermittent problems are the absolute worst to diagnose.
Agreed. And haven't gotten to that one yet. I planned on pulling the plugs out tomorrow to see if anything looked abnormal. I think I have an extra ballast resistor around. My concern is obviously that since it's random that it'll crop up at a very inopportune time.
 
Agreed. And haven't gotten to that one yet. I planned on pulling the plugs out tomorrow to see if anything looked abnormal. I think I have an extra ballast resistor around. My concern is obviously that since it's random that it'll crop up at a very inopportune time.
Absolutely. Gremlins often do.
 
Would a faulty ballast resistor cause the sputtering/potential misfire and a resulting no-start?
 
Usually a ballast issue would give a symptom of firing but immediately shutting off. At least that's the experience I've had with several different cars over 30 years.
 
Usually a ballast issue would give a symptom of firing but immediately shutting off. At least that's the experience I've had with several different cars over 30 years.
Ah, ok, thanks. Still in the back of my head but I'll keep that in kind. What would be your opinion on my issue?
 
Ah, ok, thanks. Still in the back of my head but I'll keep that in kind. What would be your opinion on my issue?
What type of ignition are you using?
 
What sort of ignition / distributor does it have? Points? Might want to swap the condenser, coils can fail under heat too. Doesn’t sound like fuel delivery from what you’ve described so far.
 
Try checking primary and secondary resistance at the coil to see if it's within specs
 
What sort of ignition / distributor does it have? Points? Might want to swap the condenser, coils can fail under heat too. Doesn’t sound like fuel delivery from what you’ve described so far.
Coil could certainly be the culprit as well.
 
I'll add checking the Blaster 2 coil to my list, thanks everyone. I'll report back with more information when I get it.
 
Spray the sparkplug wire with a water mist at night and look for misfires, if nothing look under cap for tracing. If this shows nothing then try installing a see thru fuel filter so you can check for vapor lock.
 
Hey all, took my '68 Satellite with swapped 440/6 out for a little spin last week. Shortly after leaving the driveway, it felt like it started to miss a little. I pulled into a parking lot, turned it off, waited a few minutes, and it restarted fine. Idles in the parking lot, in gear, for 20-25 minutes, occasionally coasting a few feet. Started to drive back home, started going up hill and the sputter came back. So I gave it some gas and the engine suddenly woke up and roared, sounded great. Got off the gas as I approached a stop light and started turning left. As I gave it gas out of the turn it didn't respond at all, zero acceleration. Within a few feet it shut off, in all honesty it felt like it ran out of gas but I had just filled the tank the day before. Luckily I had a few people push it to the house from the end of the street, again, incredibly lucky. No matter what we could not get it to start. It turns over like normal, the air cleaner came off and the center crab had gas coming out of the jets. A few days later went to check spark and it started on one crank. Baffled. Checked spark with a timing light and all 8 wires near the plugs showed RPM readings. ANY ideas why it randomly wanted to stall and not start??

When the car started to feel like it ran out of gas and it shut off, did you happen to notice if your gauges 'died' too or did they remain 'on'? If the gauges went dead when the car stopped running, I'm thinking possible electrical problem either in the ignition switch or at your bulkhead connector. A bad connection and/or corossion at either place will cause exactly what you described per my my experience with my '70 Cuda.
 
When the car started to feel like it ran out of gas and it shut off, did you happen to notice if your gauges 'died' too or did they remain 'on'? If the gauges went dead when the car stopped running, I'm thinking possible electrical problem either in the ignition switch or at your bulkhead connector. A bad connection and/or corossion at either place will cause exactly what you described per my my experience with my '70 Cuda.
Nope, the gauges, and dome light when I opened the door, all seemed to be working fine. Just as well, the starter sounded strong for the several times I attempted to start it over the next couple hours as it turned over but didn't start.
 
Just spitballing here but could it have started to run rich which caused the sudden surge of power when it seemingly ran strong right before it died, ridden when trying to restart it, it may have flooded? Or would it have started after an hour and a half of not running?
 
Buckeye, what do you mean "center carb had gas coming out of jets"? Do you mean accelerator pump shooter, venturi boosters or ??? May have a bad needle/seat & intermittent float level issue.
 
I'll add checking the Blaster 2 coil to my list, thanks everyone. I'll report back with more information when I get it.

Seeing your responses we know it’s got a likely quite good coil and likely quite good ignition system. Still doesn’t seem like fuel though, especially if it “resets” when it’s been off for a bit. The car wiring is likely 50 years old though, any chance there’s something intermittent in getting power to the ignition system in the first place? Power feed to the control box? Could put a multimeter on the input, turn on the ignition and have a friend watch it while you jostle around the wiring, under dash too.
 
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