What To Do When Your Vehicle Stalls On The Highway

This is one of those nightmare situations for any driver, you’re going down the freeway and your car starts to sputter. If you’re in the middle lanes, you have to start working your way towards the side with an emergency lane, all while slowing down. It’s a nerve-wracking experience that you have to manage quickly if you want to stay safe. If you don’t manage this you’ll be broken down in the middle of the freeway. This is incredibly unsafe for you, and everyone else on the road. Keep calm, work your way to the edge. Get in the emergency/breakdown lane. If you don’t, you might wind up in the hospital and in need of Simi Center in Simi Valley. The next thing to do is get turn on your caution lights. This lets everyone else know that there’s a problem and that you’re not going anywhere.

There are a few things that might have gone wrong. Your car may not have even stalled, but instead, you encountered a reason that you had to pull over like having just hit road debris. 

Dead Battery

This is fairly common, especially in older cars. While you’re driving, several different parts of the car run directly off of the battery. This includes spark plugs, air conditioning, gauges, even the throttle in some cars. The car needs the power that the battery provides. The only reason that it stays fully charged throughout the drive to and from wherever you’re going is that there’s another part powered by the spin of the engine that keeps the battery charged. Due to a fault in this piece (Called the alternator) or because of a defect in the battery, you may find yourself suddenly without power and unable to drive. There’s not much you can do at this point on your own, as jumping off the car is only a temporary solution, that will fail as soon as you disconnect the cables. You need to get a tow truck to take your car to the mechanic so that you can get a battery swap. In most cases, it’s a fast process.  

Engine Trouble

So many things can go wrong with the engine that I can’t list them all. You could have something as simple as a belt snap. It could be much more serious, and expensive like a timing chain breaking. If that happens, you’ll have to replace the entire engine. It could be that you ran the car without oil for too long (or on bad oil), and the engine has locked up as a result. It’s unlikely, unless you’re an expert, that you’ll know exactly what went wrong. It’s even more unlikely that you’ll be able to fix the problem on the side of the road. Just call the tow truck and get the car to a mechanic for a proper diagnosis. 

Transmission

If the transmission decides to give out Then your car might suddenly be unable to get power from the engine to the wheels. Hopefully, it doesn’t cause a chain reaction of the engine being locked up with it. The transmission is the part of the car that actually moves the power from the engine to the wheels. There’s any number of things that can go wrong with your transmission. They’re so complex that most mechanics have transmission specialists in the shop just to deal with transmissions that come through the door. This is also one of the most expensive things to possibly breakdown. Given the complexity of the part, even diagnosis can be expensive in some shops. 

Flat Tire

This is among the most common and the most innocuous reasons your car might be sidelined on the freeway. It could be that a piece of road debris has lodged itself in the tire, and now it’s flat. In the worst case, you hit a pothole, and now your rim is bent. Most people have a spare in their car for just such an event. If you’re capable of replacing the tires yourself with the spare, then you can, in other cases, you should call a tow truck. 

Conclusion

Hopefully, you don’t find yourself pulled over on the freeway, but if you do, the best thing you can do is call a tow truck. Most of the time, you won’t be able to fix the problem by yourself on the side of the road. While they’re en route, you should be calling different auto body shops and finding one that you want to work with. Hopefully, the reason you’re on the side of the road isn’t going to result in you needing an Simi Center in Simi Valley. It may not just be your car broken down. You may find yourself needing Semi-Truck repair in Simi Valley, trailer repair in Simi Valley, or even RV repair in Simi Valley. If you’re ever in this situation, the answer is always the same, and Simi Center can cover it all.