Car Dies – Diagnosis Appreciated

[CobERA]

In my last three outings of any distance my car has died on me. The most recent instances occurred Saturday night. We were making a 50 minute drive. We had been cruising on a highway for about 40 minutes when we reached our exit. As I was on the exit ramp the car quit running. I was able to coast to a parking lot where I let the car sit for 5 to 10 minutes, and then it started up again and we were able to travel the last 3 miles to our destination. I checked under the hood and the only thing I could see that might be a problem was that the braided fuel line was tucked under the heater hoses and touching the intake manifold. The fuel line was very hot. I thought perhaps it was a vapor lock problem so before we left for home, I lifted the fuel line above the heater hoses, closed the heater hose valve and put some exhaust wrap on the fuel line temporarily to keep it from getting so hot.

However, on the trip home, the same thing happened. After a 40 minute cruise on the highway, as I was exiting, the car died again on the ramp! We were able to once again coast to a parking lot, sit for 5 minutes, then started it up and made it the rest of the way home.

I had a similar instance a couple of months ago where as I approached an intersection, it died. Since then I have replaced the coil, alternator, battery, voltage regulator and fuel filter.

While driving the car seems to run fine. Water and oil temps are good, oil pressure is fine and ammeter shows a charge.

I have a 428 FE, with a Holley 750 with vacuum secondaries and MSD 6AL ignition. I have a little over 18,000 miles on the car and never had these problems until recently. The only other changes I can remember making within the last few months was adding a ½ inch phenolic spacer under the carb, a lower drop base and a taller K&N air filter.

Any thoughts on what might be happening? I suspect that the fact that the car died both times on exit ramps after running at highway speeds for 40 minutes is not coincidental.

Thanks,