so the owner of the car who is a girl has a girlfriend .......nice

I like your way of thinking

 

Things I've had happen to make my car quit and refuse to start:
Failed fuel pump; clogged fuel filter; out of gas; failed valve adjustment nuts; over heated; failed coil; failed ignition points; and a battery give it up-didn't kill the car but it wouldn't start after I shut it off. I could write a book!

 

Like previously stated, it can run a long time on no alternator. I once drove about 150 miles, 50 at night with headlights on, restarting several times, and didn't kill the battery. We used to run the race cars with no alternator to save HP. We'd often jump charge them off the tow vehicle in the morning and race a couple of practice sessions and a race each day.



Broke a camshaft. that would involve pulling the engine, cleaning it all out, and probably a week of work at least if he was a well-equipped mechanic and garage.

Of course, it is usually a more violent stop, lots of banging and such.


Electrical is a quick silent stop, and a quick fix if you know what you are doing.

Fuel pump is a quick silent stop. But it can be fixed in a few hours.

Four speed or automatic? Either way, the car runs, but doesn't go anywhere. Coast off to the side and stops if you lose a clutch or the automatic goes out. It could take a few days to fix.


Rear wheel bearings are good. You can get lots of smoke that scares the driver the car is on fire, and once it sits, the melted bearings don't let it go again. Long ago, you were towed to the local Chevy dealer and in 6 hours, you were ready to go. Today, I doubt anyone in a Chevy dealership has a clue on doing them. Most people simply send them out to Van Steel, Bair's, or others and wait for the whole training arm to come back looking new.



Timeline? What time period? The time to fix is related to the time it occurs. Today, you can get much more in a hurry than long ago. but then, some parts were available immediately at the local parts store.

In 1965, most weren't so quick to dive into rebuilding an engine or a transmission.



Is this from personal experience?

 

vapor lock would be a carburetor problem, thats a good easy fix for your hero, but I like the bad alternator, She could have lost the alternator belt which would be a quick fix and would give her the symptoms,...... alternator adjustment bolt lossenned up, belt falls off and is hanging there. The alternator fails because its no longer spinning, no charge to the system so the car has been running off the battery for the last 100 miles or so, or it happened the previous days and she has been running on it for a while. Very plausible and happens in the real world

I had little glowing ***** shooting out from the hood of my 69 GTO on a cross country tripin 84, turned out they were alternator bearings. Limped down the highway for a while without lights to keep it running until we found a parts store to sleep at until it oened in the morning. Put in a new alternator and roll started it in the parking lot and we were back on the road....My Hero

 

I like the broken belt scenario, alternator not charging and the battery goes down, down, down. A good mechanic will see it quickly but most likely won't have a belt to do the job quickly...so he will have to use his ingenuity to give her a temporary belt...

Needless to say, she will be impressed, and grateful, I'm just sayin...

Sounds fun. Thanks for asking.

David

 

65 Corvette -----> Over heating

 

Food For Thought: why not empower your heroine and have her know more about her 65 Corvette than anyone else? Why not have her tell Linc what she thinks the problem is...and have her be right?

 

Space Ninjas crapped in the carb blocking the fuel supply.

 

Fuel filter....Happened to me.

Brian

 

It ran out of blinker fluid

Pay attention guys. "So far it has driven about a mile and began sputtering..." I don't think even a '65 can vapor lock or overheat in that time. And if the car started there is plenty of battery power to go a mile, so it's not the alternator.

I'd go with a stuck carburetor float. Link figures it out quickly because he sees the carb is not putting out any gas after he removes the air cleaner and looks inside while turning the throttle. It would take him a hour or so to open it up and un-stick it, and reassemble. Or he could rebuild it, which would take longer. Or he could tap the bowls with a screwdriver handle and loosen it, and the hottie could be on her way in under 5 minutes.

OP, I like that you are trying to get these details right, because when I read books that become too unbelievable or lacking in correct technical details I loose interest. In that vein, I would make the Corvette a '63, simply because even a shade-tree mechanic like Link can instantly recognize a '63 by the split rear window. The differences between a 64-67 are less noticeable.

What color hair and eyes does she have...and her dimensions please.

 

Dear flightpretty....he could be a 'hero' under the stuck float scenario...(I've been a mechanic for 52 years and have seen EVERYTHING.)
The hero opens the hood...pops off the aircleaner with a flourish...raps on the float bowl chamber (right on top of a Rochester 4MV {'cept in a 65 it's a Holley ...same diff) with a hammer rap-rap-rap....all fixed.

Made me a $100 tip at 2:00 in the morning back in the day when $100 was more like S1000.

The '65 has disc Brakes!

 

I'd go with the disconnected/loose coil wire. Easy to notice, test, and fix.... without turning it into a novel...

 

this must be a far fetched sort of sci fi novel, everybody knows that Corvettes don't break down

 

Yes, she can tell Link that she thinks it is a problem with the battery and when he goes to look under the hood she tells him that the battery is behind the seat in a Corvette, and she gets to watch him bend over awkwardly to check it...fast forward to married with three kids and the care ends up on this site for sale. And it should be a 69 Vette for obvious reasons.

 

Except that the battery is under the hood of a 1965 to the right of the engine without air and to the left of the engine with air.

Battery behind the seats started in 1968.

 

I would have that sexy babe from Terminator 3 Rise of The Machines stick her finger in the ignition to re-program the car to do what she wants (even though it doesn't have a computer).

 

You know a lot of horror movies start out this way, but so does a lot of ****.
I'd go with the the coil wire coming off, quick, easy and wham bam thank you mam out of there looking good.
Wait, are we still talking ****?

 

Well I did say that it should be a 69

I guess for more than one reason.

 

Id go with the stuck float scenario., coil wire used quite often