My 59 broke down for the first time today.

[INTMD8]

After putting over 10k miles on my 59 it finally left me stranded today.

Drove it for 30 minutes and parked for 10. Restarted and died about 30 seconds later. Seemed like it was out of fuel and the glass filter bowl was only half way full so I thought the pump went bad.

Had it towed home and it fired right up, filling up the bowl no problem.

Pretty sure I know what happened. When I had the tank out over the winter I replaced the inline filter (I added one right after the tank when I first got it running a few years back).  Switched from a see through plastic type to a metal canister.

My theory is, the new filter is more restrictive so now that I've driven it on a warm day the pump was pulling too much vacuum on the inlet side and it vapor locked.

I'm going to remove the filter back by the tank and see how it does.

Whoops 

[Jeff Rosansky CLC #28373]

Too bad. They sure do look pathetic on the back of a truck, don't they?
Jeff

[INTMD8]

Nah still beautiful.

Even as it was being winched up several people walked up and said "awesome car". I said well better when it's running, response, "it's still awesome".

That's classic Cadillac 

[Skwerly62]

Too bad. They sure do look pathetic on the back of a truck, don't they?
Jeff

Makes the big ol rollback look pathetic with all that steel gorgeousness on the back...

[Roger Zimmermann]

Have maybe a look at your fuel pump. It can happen that one valve is not seated correctly. A friend of mine had this problem far away from home. One of both valves was dislodged. However, when cold, he could start the engine.

[INTMD8]

Thanks guys. Roger, I pulled the top of the pump off and both valves appeared to be seated.

Just removed the filter, seemed rather restrictive (for the suction side) so time for a test drive.

[R S Steven]

By chance did you put winter gas in it.  If yes it could be vapor lock.  I had bought gas before putting my 59 away for the winter a few years ago. In the spring I had a hell of a time with it not wanting to restart after stopping for a short time. I had to pour gas down the carb and water over the fuel pump in order to get it restarted.  Not till I was able to get better than 1/2 a tank of summer fuel in it would it restart after stopping.

Hope this helps,
Bob

[INTMD8]

Hi Bob, yes the last time I fueled it up was winter fuel so I'm sure that wasn't helping, thanks.

So far so good after removing the in-line filter. Drove it around for 2 hours stopping at a few stores along the way.