If l drive out of town or even for thirty minutes straight when l try to stop the car acts like it wants to die, even take off is sluggish. what could be the problem.
i didnt buy the car from anyone, has been in the family since 1988.

Ask the place you bought the car from.

maybe coil or fuel filter

Sounds like the timing chain or the alternator is going.. more than likely the alternator. If the alternator is not working correctly it is not charging the battery thus you are running straight fromn the battery and the vehiclew will start to die as the battery runs down. sounds like an intermittent fluxuation that is why you have not died yet

That should be an Oldsmobile 307/5.0. It still has a carburetor. They have a air heated choke on them. After some time it does not operate properly. That in itself is a problem but the big problem is it causes the car to run rich. Among other things (like poor mileage) it tends to plug up the catalytic converter which makes the thing run poorly & loose power. First thing to check is after the car is warmed up take the air cleaner cover off & see if choke is fully open. The air cleaner cover is the large black round disk on the top center of the engine. The cover is held on with a wing nut. Unscrew the nut & lift just the cover portion off. With this off u will see the round air filter & in the middle of that will be the top of the carburetor. You will see the screw that held the nut sticking up. In front of that screw u will see a rectangle opening with a flap in it. When the engine is fully warmed up ( 10 minutes of running should do it) this flap should be totally vertical so it does not slow down the air flow. l suspect that u will find that it is at least 1/2 shut. You can do this with the engine running but u must be careful not to get caught in any belts or the fan. If u r more comfortable doing it off just do it quickly after shutting the engine off, u still need to take care not to touch anything that is hot. If u find that its not open all the way u need to get it fixed. When u r calling shops tell them that it has a carburetor. They will likely not believe you, at that point thank them for the info & hang up. Once u find someone that knows what a carburetor is they should be able to fix it. On some of mine l have ended up installing an electric choke so u could mention that to them as a possible option. If that was the problem once its fixed u should put in new spark plugs (cap, rotor, & wires if they r due also) & have them check the catalytic converter to make sure its not blocked. If u cant get it fixed right away u can jam something in that flap to hold it open. You have to find something that wont fall in or block the air, l have used those heavy duty black paper clip things with the chrome levers. The down side is u need to remove it to get the engine started when the engine is cold & then put it on when its warmed up. Thats a lot of work to open the hood, take off the air cleaner cover, insert or remove clip, & put back cover, close hood. It does beat walking though.

Good Luck!