Im driving on the highway today doing about 70-80mph and my hatch stops responding to the throttle, then picks back up for a second, then stops responding again, then the motor cuts off. I try to start it back up and I get alot of rumbling one or two cylinders fire, but it wont stay on. I already replaced the plugs thinking maybe they were bad. Does anyone have any guesses whats going on? Maybe the fuel pump is bad? Injectors? Please help, its my daily driver and its all I have.

 

My two guesses are the distributor ignitor failing and the setscrew that holds the distributor rotor falling out and losing it's indexing. I have had both happen to me and what you describe happens. If it is the rotor setscrew, the car will not refire but it is an easy fix as long as you are careful when you remove the distributor cap as the screw will be loose in the cap and you don't want to drop and lose it.

Ignitor is common and much more expensive.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by CRX Lee &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">My two guesses are the distributor ignitor failing and the setscrew that holds the distributor rotor falling out and losing it's indexing.
Ignitor is common and much more expensive.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Thats what i was gunna say. also make sure your battery is held down. mine wasnt and it would hit the dizzy and my car would just start slowing down very very slow.and evenually die out. then you go to start it and it sounds liek your using 10 batteries to turn the starter over, it sounds like it was spinning the starter about 1000000000times a second.

 

Those are good theroys. I just replaced the coil in the distributer so I dont think there is anything wrong there. I will check the rotor. Does anyone else have any ideas?

 

I had this happen on my way to work. Towed it home and put in a spare ignitor and cap. Fired right up and hasn't given trouble since. ( Knock on wood). Also have you checked the ground wires? Hope it works out.