Triumph Repair: 1980 Triumph Spitfire 1500, fuel pressure gauge, triumph spitfire 1500

Question
I recently bought a low mileage 1980 Spitfire. The car is a pleasure to drive.  I have been driving it lightly on local roads and have had no problems.  Today, however, I took the car out on the highway.  The car ran fine and engine temp looked good.  I came to a heavily congested stretch of road and slowed down, and the car stalled.  After some time and using a little ether in the carb and reseating the coil wire, it started up and ran fine.  The car did the same thing on the way home.  Eventually had the car transported home, where it sat for about two hours.  I removed air filter and tried to start again.  Started right up.  Any idea what might be going on?  Thanks in advance.

Answer
Hi George,
The only way you will know what failed since it only fails for a short time is to see it fail at the time it fails. Put a timing light on the coil wire (not the plug wire) and run the wires of the light out from under the hood and place the timing light under a wiper arm with the trigger taped down so you can see the flash of the light as you drive.

Then put a "T" in the fuel line at the carb and run a long hose out from under the hood and place a fuel pressure gauge under the other wiper arm so as to watch fuel pressure at the time of failure. (1.5 PSI to 3 PSI)(be sure to put hose clamps at all joints)

This way you can see if you have a ignition failure or a fuel supply failure at the exact time the engine dies.

Howard