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Originally Posted by willd
Not three miles onto French soil, the car cuts out completely. All electrics are fine, the engine just died. Wouldn't catch on turning over at all.
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Sounds curiously like what happened to me recently (my car: '02 S, 71k mi), but unfortunately at Home Depot in New Jersey, not France. France is one of the few places I wouldn't mind being stranded. Turned out a faulty voltage regulator had caused the battery to very rapidly discharge to near zero with no warning whatsoever.
After you get the boot and bonnet open, measure your battery voltage (see threads for specs), then charge it thoroughly overnight, or if it's more than few years old strongly consider simply replacing it. I'd just replaced my battery not more than a week before experiencing this failure.
Search this site for "alternator" or "alternator failure" to find a number of very good threads on troubleshooting your charging system and alternator removal. Replacement of the faulty voltage regulator, which is part of the alternator, is inexpensive (the part was $15, some people have paid up to $65) and very quick once you get the alternator out. Overall, not a bad DIY project for someone like me with very average mechanical skills.
Don't get discouraged, your Boxster DOES love you, it just gets a little cranky occasionally. As you say in the UK, "Keep your pecker up."
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