Alright here's what happened:

I had been drving down the highway back to school. Already traveled almost 260 miles and then my car literally shuts off as I'm driving down the road. Luckily I was within a couple miles of my apartment but I have no idea what happened. I restarted it, it started alright but chugged a little and at idle it was making a ticking sound. Then as soon as I gave it gas there was no power and it died. Started once more with same result then it wouldn't start anymore.

Oil is fine so I don't think it could have seized up, plus it wouldn't have started again if it did right? It had enough gas, battery was fine. I've been advised to check my timing belt to see if it's alright, as well as a fuel or ignition problem. I've never taken off the timing cover but that should be easy. Assuming the belt is fine, how do I go about checking for fuel problems?

Please, do you have any ideas or advice for how to look for things that could have gone wrong? I'd rather not pay a shop to find the problem and fix it because I don't have a ton of money and I know a shop would stick me with a huge bill.

Thanks for any and all help!

checked timing belt... the belt is fine and the allignment marks on the cam gears are still together. took a video of trying to start it, it turned over but won't start. sounds horrible so I don't want to do it anymore, but I thought having a video might help you all figure out potential problems. I'll post the link to the video once it registers with youtube.

this is painful to listen to... but here's the vid:

YouTube.com

I did have this happen to my car once when I was driving down to Woodbridge. I was on 95 right before the Prince William Prkwy exit.

Car did the same. Started it once, and then it died, was making rather horrible sounds, so I had it towed to the dealer.

Turns out the timing belt skipped a tooth. Luckily no damage to the valves etc, but timing had to be done. This was right at 60K when the service interval was due.

Sorry to hear bout it bro. Hope you get it running soon. Make sure that you replace the idler pulley too while you are in there. $45 from the dealer, but xtra insurance.

Later
Jonathan

but when I checked the timing belt, the two white dots on the cam gears were perfectly alligned... but i guess it could have still skipped on something other than the cam gears. thanks Jon, i'll keep that in mind. i don't really know how to check on things like that though so I may have to bring it to a shop after all...

There was a recall a long time ago on the ECU because the car would randomly die at like 50mph or something, I think it was only on 95's though

Yah, I had that happen as well, however, it would just die, start back up and then eventually die after more driving. Chris's car is def not the ECU with all that clanking etc.