Way back in the 90s I had a Vauxhall Cavalier estate that developed the habit of just completely dying. Just like that. Could happen anywhere. Sometimes it would restart in five minutes, other times 24 hours wasn't enough for it. I had to be rescued by the AA several times, once from half-way up the M5. After over a year of all the mechanics round here theorising and trying everything to no avail, someone said that they'd heard of a friend of a friend of a friend who'd had the same trouble, and he'd cured it by getting a new distributor. So off I went to a junkyard and picked up one from a scrapped car for a few quid. Swapped it over with mine, and, after a bit of jiggling around with the timing, it worked a treat and I never had the problem again.