Battery Cable problems of the 1999 Honda Accord

While driving the vehicle, the engine will quit completely without any warning or indication of malfunction; it just stops. Sometimes it will start up again immediately, sometimes multiple attempts where it catches for a fraction of a second and stops again have been required over a period of several minutes. Over time, it seemed to become clear that turning the key to the off position instead of attempting a start from acc would almost always result in immediate restart. The issue disappeared over what was a fairly cold winter, but has returned with the warming weather. Total number of occurrences: somewhere around fifty or higher. Sometimes it would happen numerous times the same day, increasingly with increased temperature, and seemed much more prone to occur when the air-conditioning was in use. The repair shop was never able to capture an obd code with its recording device. As a commuter on rural roads, this has been inconvenient but so far not unsafe, but there is a potential for it occurring under adverse traffic conditions that might be unsafe, e. G. , at highway speed with close following traffic on a road with no shoulder. These incidents may or may not be related to two repairs that almost immediately preceded the first occurrence of this problem: 1. The car wouldn't start one day, no electrical output at all was available, though the battery was only a few months old. A local (I. E. , non-dealer) repair shop replace the negative battery cable that grounds the battery to the vehicle. 2. Timing belt replacement was performed a couple of months prior, again by a local repair shop.