Sudden Engine Turnoff

I'll try to explain as best as I can. When I was driving back from hunting on a dirt road riddled with pot holes and washboard. I came around a corner, hit a pothole and that's when bad things happened. The headlights flashed once and then completely cut out and wouldn't turn back on even after the car came to a full stop. Right after the headlights cut out the engine shutoff and refused to start again. When I turned the key to try and turn the car over all I got was the click, click, click (repeating) from the starter. This happened on a 94 geo metro with 193,000 miles on it.

Thankfully there were some considerate hunters in the area that gave me a ride back to town. Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Start by checking your battery cables. Clean them and make sure that they are tight. If the battery is dead you might have a bad altenator. Also check your fuses under the dash and the ones next to the battery. Try jumper cables to see if you can get it started. If it starts and quits as soon as you unhook the cables the altenator isn't putting out enough juice to keep it running so it's probably shot. Ken....

How old is the battery?

The battery is 3 years old and still under an 84 month limited warranty. And the alternator is about the same age. The fuses under the dash are all good, haven't checked the ones next to the battery but that is coming up.

Honk your horn + turn your bright lights on.
Is you horn Load?

Check for anything loose that could have pinched a wire. Years ago after I changed my clutch, I had an issue with a certain fuse going bad and causing a stall. It happened about 3-4 times. The last time I was on the highway. I had to pull over and replace the fuse. That was the last time though. I guess it sorted itself out? Anyway, I suspect that I had made a mistake somewhere close to the trans or the starter and pinched a wire when putting things back together. Luckily the problem stopped.

Maybe you loosened something up under the hood and it is causing a wire somewhere to ground out? Wish I was better help than that.

Good Luck,

Jai

Thank you for everyones help. I got the Adventure Geo almost all back up and running. Just down to needing new headlights. So I can drive in the daylight all I want, just no night driving as of yet. The problem parts that it had were an extremely dead battery. There were only 6.32 volts in it. And a dead alternator. I had taken it in to get tested and about 2.5 seconds into a 5 minute test it failed. So I have those new parts in and it's running as good as it can for having sat for a bit and the outside temperature. Along with new battery terminal connectors as the ones that had been on the car were pretty corroded.