Hi everyone,

So, a new problem for me, the guy driving the 1989 240DL across the country. No, it's not the coolant again—Paul Schlicht at Schlicht Automotive in Viroqua, Wisconsin, took care of that. Here's what it is:

Today, around 1pm, I was driving about 70mph near the South Dakota/Nebraska border. The outside temperature was about 100 degrees, but my temperature gauge was still cool and "steady Eddie," as Paul proclaimed it. All of a sudden, though, I started losing power—as if the gas simply wasn't getting to the engine. Eventually, I had to downshift, then downshift again, until I completely crapped out on the side of the road.

A couple of guys stopped to help me move the car onto the grass, suggested it might be a "vapor lock" problem, but there was no hiss of gas when I removed the cap. Instead, I let the car rest for about 30 minutes, then started it up again and drove 60mph into the next town, Chadron, where I spent the hot afternoon watching a movie. The car seems to be running fine again now—no sign of any leaks of any kind—but I'm nervous that what happened before will happen again. There's a garage here—Rick's Foreign Auto—and I may bring it there tomorrow, but I'd love to hear your ideas of what could be wrong. Bad fuel filter? Bad fuel pump? Some other dreaded trouble?

Looking forward to your advice...

—Matt