3 hours ago, chaseincats said:

Interesting - thanks for this. When using this, does that mean the 'transistor ignition unit' in the passenger foot well is disabled and that box I took a picture of is running instead? I have no idea what the point of this thing is but I've never messed with it since the car runs.

It should mean that. The 78 TIU uses a plug so you should be able to just take a look and see if it's unplugged. If it's still there, I'd leave it just in case you need to go back to it.

I'd also take a look at how the Energy-Pak is wired in, for future reference. It pays to be prepared with these old cars.

On 5/1/2026 at 11:01 PM, chaseincats said:

I haven't had this issue again, but tonight I was driving, stopped at a stoplight after being on the freeway for about 20 minutes, and the car shut off like a switch was pulled (didn't stumble and die so it would be a spark issue). Could this be related? This is the first time I've had this happen ever.

If it helps, I turned the key and it immediately fired right up like nothing happened.

This is a not uncommon sign of a failing ignition module. Get ready...

1 hour ago, Zed Head said:

It should mean that. The 78 TIU uses a plug so you should be able to just take a look and see if it's unplugged. If it's still there, I'd leave it just in case you need to go back to it.

I'd also take a look at how the Energy-Pak is wired in, for future reference. It pays to be prepared with these old cars.

I just checked and the TIU is still there AND is plugged in which is interesting

1 hour ago, Zed Head said:

This is a not uncommon sign of a failing ignition module. Get ready...

This ended up actually being unrelated and fixed a few months back:

The car shut off after I hit a bump. I discovered if I knocked on the black relay box/bracket under the hood, the car would die. I unbolted the bracket and one of the relays (I don't recall which one) had something loose in it because any slight wobble and the engine would stumble - and a light flick would kill it. I opened the relay itself and there was something loose (I don't remember what) - I bent whatever it was back into place and now I can smack the hell out of the bracket without the engine blinking an eye. I also found out that the connectors that went from the engine harness to the ECU temp sensors were weak to the point where if I (also) wobble those, the engine would stumble and die.

Basically I went on a SHAKE EVERYTHING tour of the engine bay and we're all good now.