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Mystery Noise

Sept 1, 2009: Car prepped for long drive to Portland, OR from Socal. Perfect. Three mos later gave it oil change for long trip back to SoCal. Perfect. Couple of days later, car made loud noise. Felt like it would die. Turned car off. Couple seconds later turned on and perfect. This has continued to happen with no rhyme or reason. Doesn’t matter if it’s hot or cold, up or downhill. Only constant seems to be that the car is going slowly. No one ever drives with me so no one ever hears it. Because it happens sporadically (can go a couple of wks with nothing, then it can happen 3x in one errand outing) I left it at the mechanic’s so they could drive it occasionally. It never happened for them. It’s quite loud. The car doesn’t seem to actually vibrate violently, but it sounds as if it’s going to up and die on the spot. I turn it off. Turn it on 2 seconds later and it’s fine–until it happens again. The CR-V is a '98

The word “noise” is pretty vague. Unless you can give us some idea what the noise sounds like it’s going to be impossible to even guess what might be causing it.

Describe the sound to the best you your ability, and tell us where you think it’s coming from.

Since I don’t know anything about the inner workings of a car, it’s hard for me to say “where” I think it’s coming from. It seems like a huge rattling/sputtering sound from the front of the vehicle. I get the feeling that if I didn’t turn the car off, it would simply die. There is some vibration, but nothing earthquake-like.
I’m sorry I’m not more help. This is extremely frustrating because I can’t recreate conditions that will make it happen so someone can hear it. It does it when it wants to. I appreciate your efforts here, believe me.