While I was driving, the car died out; lights dimming, car stopped running, radio went off. It started right back up, just for it to die out 30 seconds later. There wasn't a loud bang, or anything, the car still has oil, full gas tank. The temperature gauge was at below half (where it normally sits for my car) The battery wasn't dead, because headlights, hazards, dash lights, radio all still worked. When I tried starting, it almost turned over, and would try to turn over, but couldn't. Pumped the gas pedal, it would barely run before dying out again.
I had it towed to my step dads shop so he could work on it. He thought it was the fuel pump, but when he went out to see if it wouldn't turn over again like it did to me, the car turned on, and he drove it around his parking lot no problems.

Any ideas as to what could have happened?

 

Also, it's a 2.5 V6, if that helps any.

 

Check for a bad ground or loose connection somewhere. At the battery, engine computer, distributor, fuse boxes, etc.

 

My step dad has checked all of them, and said they were fine.
He noticed a rattling noise when he let it run. Any idea if that could be the problem? Or what it could be from?

 

He's gotten it to start a few times. The first time after the tow that he tried, it started right up. When he went to move it into the garage, it took a few tries to start.
I just want my Sebring back. I'm not a fan of the intrepid I'm borrowing.

 

Hey,

I have seen this very same problem happen to quite a few 2.5s. What you want to do is check the crankshaft position sensor. When they go bad, the signal they output becomes intermittent. Usually this means the car will start and drive fine until it gets to operating temperatures and then shutoff but restart once the engine cools just a tiny bit.

 

Also, it could be the camshaft sensor inside the distributor but that is far less likely.

 

My sebring was stalling not too long ago too, and would run normally at times, turned out to be my EGR valve, very hard to diagnose, took it to three shops before it was fixed.

 

So, we replaced the fuel pump (it was no longer working, so that was a problem)
Now, we have a new problem. We decided to bring it home from the shop. On the way home, it was skipping and back firing, and then died. This happened after it ran at proper temperature for some time. We towed it the rest of the way with our explorer. When we got it into the driveway, it started right up. There is a possibility it's the coil in the distributer; is there a way to test this to find out if its the entire distributer or if its just the coil? We know the plug wire test, but that's not going to be much help because its obviously sparking since it starts and runs fine for hours on end while not moving.