Chrysler Repair: 85 Lebaron engine dies when hot, then recovers when cooled., hall effect sensor, running down the road

Question
I have an issue with my car. When it sits at idle for too long it will die and will not start back up for an hour to three hours. When you drive it, it will shut off and do the same thing and not start for a couple hours and also somtimes when you are running down the road it will die. I have replaced the coil, PCM, automatic shut down relay and I am driving myself crazy. The check engine light does not come on either. It does work but does not come on when this happens. Please help.

Answer
Hi Matt,
I suspect the hall effect sensor in the distributor is failing when it gets warm. You can possibly get a fault code readout to verify that: use the ignition key, "on-off-on-off-on and leave on" doing that in 5 seconds or less elapsed time. Then watch the check engine light which remains "on" to begin to flash, pause, flash, etc. Count the number of flashes before each pause. Then repeat to be sure you have an accurate count. The last two sets of flashes will always be 5 in number. Then group the counts in pairs in the order of appearance to form two-digit numbers which are the fault codes. The last number will be 55 which is the code for "end of readout". The other numbers are relevant codes. The 11 code says the signal from the sensor in the distributor is not getting to the PCM. Go to www.allpar.com/fix/codes.html for a list of the other number codes.
Let me know what happens, but that is my first suspicion about why the car is dying as you describe it to do. The sensor is replaceable at a cost of about $40 for the part. Just remove the rotor, the cover plate, and then you will see it for replacement.
Roland