Wow…if my 5 examples fall in the category of “crippling car breakdowns”, your two examples seem to warrant their own label – “disastrous and utterly devastating breakdowns”. I can’t think of anything more extreme except perhaps full on car explosions!

Thanks for sharing

I had an alternator break on the way home from work. My alternator light came on, but the rest of the car ran fine. Seeing this, I immediately turned off my radio, dash lights, and ran on parking lights. I coasted as much as I could to reduce the need for sparks. My car ran for about 15 minutes and got me that much closer to home. I did not replace my battery.

#6: Timing Belt or Chain (depends on what you have)

A timing belt (or chain) controls the timing of the engine’s valves in relation to the engine pistons. The timing chain is an internal engine component and is NOT visible on the outside. Don’t get confused with the serpentine belt which is visible on the outside and is routed around all sorts of engine components like your AC compressor, power steering etc.

If your timing chain breaks while you are driving the engine will no longer function and you will be dead in the water just as if your alternator failed, however the collateral damage can be huge. When the timing belt breaks the moving pistons and valves loose their coordination and the piston will come to the top of the cylinder and slam into the open valves (valves are normally closed when the piston comes to the top of the cylinder). The valves (and probably the pistons) will be damaged beyond repair. So, instead of just having to replace the timing belt you’ll be doing a complete engine breakdown to replace broken valves and damaged pistons. This is probably one of the most catastrophic events (next to a fire) that can happen to your car. On older cars, this is usually a death blow event since the repair is many thousands of dollars and far exceeds the value of the car.

So how do you know when to replace the timing belt? You don’t. As part of preventative maintenance you should replace the belt every 60,000 miles. When the engine is being reassembled, new parts (water pump, seals, pulleys etc) should all be replaced since the work to install an old part is the same as installing a new part. You don’t want to reinstall a 60,000 mile water pump only to have it fail 5,000 miles later when it would have only cost $45 more for a new pump when the timing belt was being fixed. You’re paying for the labor anyway.

#7: I mentioned the serpentine belt above that is visible on the outside of the engine. This belt should be frequently checked for wear. If that belt breaks will you’re driving you’ll loose key functionality very quickly. With your serpentine belt laying on the highway 5 miles back, your alternator will not function (see tip #1 for repercussions). You will also loose power steering. The danger is that if you traveling down the highway at 60 MPH and all of sudden your belt breaks you’ll quickly loose speed as your engine stalls but you will have a tough time making lane changes to get away from the tractor trailer behind you, because you’ll also have no power steering. If you find yourself in that situation, get those hazard lights on ASAP, even while coasting. You’ll be at a dead stop in a few hundred feet.

Second one for the little thing, too. Of course, that first one was almost 100k miles ago, so I can’t complain much!