Just took off my cat.. and did something STUPID!

gn85 · 07-08-2005, 03:22 AM

Hello all,

I failed emissions on Wednesday, so I ordered a cat from rockauto.com (great service and fast). I got the cat today and decided to take the cat off. I unbolted it from the header, unbolted the hanger under the engine and let the rubber bands go. I got two of the bolts of the flange for the cat off, but was having probs with the third.

**here comes something stupid I did**

I started working on this bolt... got my wrench on there and started to wrench away. SNAP! Thought the bolt broke.. NOPE! The PIPE snapped at the resonator! Snapped it CLEAN off. DAMN!

So, I need to get a resonator tomorrow.

If there's any bit of good news out of this, I think it'd be the fact that I found my problem. The cat was trashed.. just one chunk laying sideways in it. Shining my flashlight down the resonator found a few more small chunks of cat material.

I'm only fearing now that there's more in the muffler.

Wish me luck.

PurdueGuy · 07-08-2005, 04:40 AM

good luck! Count it as a blessing - now you might get better gas milage with a properly working cat.

the Shaolin UWP · 07-08-2005, 04:43 AM

Replace the resonator with a glasspack

That's what I did.

gn85 · 07-08-2005, 05:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PurdueGuy

good luck! Count it as a blessing - now you might get better gas milage with a properly working cat.

Actually, I was getting decent mileage already... this will be the icing on the cake. Strangely enough the car was somewhat eratic with performance. Most of the time it was OK, but occasionally it'd get sluggish when hot. I'm wondering if this was the culprit. Very interesting.

I like the idea of a glasspack. I didn't even think of that.

Can that resonator be removed and replaced with a straight pipe? Will that hurt anything?

Thanks.

gn85 · 07-09-2005, 01:56 AM

OK, now I really need to ask. Does the resonator make a difference?? Reason I ask, I just learned the SOHC cars don't have the resonator. I can't imagine that the DOHC make so much noise that they need this thing on there.

**Ssicarman** · 07-09-2005, 02:09 AM

You want some thing in there. You will get popping from the exhaust without it. There was one year of SOHC engine that we had to install a resonator in if there was a customer complaint of popping noise from the exhaust.

scottyr94 · 07-09-2005, 08:54 PM

I would just put on back in there. The glasspack idea would work great since a glasspack basically is just a resonator. They really do nothing for quieting it down any, but rather make the tone different and less raspy.

gn85 · 07-09-2005, 09:07 PM

Thanks for the responses... I'll put one back in there when I can find a good one or get the money to put a new one in. This was somewhat of an emergency fix because I have to go thru emissions.

Hopefully with the new cat, I'll get thru emissions no problem.

Thanks again for the quick answers.

ian12 · 07-09-2005, 10:16 PM

im using a glasspack for a resonator with an apex n1 muffler

gn85 · 07-11-2005, 06:10 PM

I put a straight piece on for the time being and ran emissions again with the new cat. Here are my results.

1st test

HC = 2.2794 GPM limit = .9000 GPM FAIL
CO = 9.2163 GPM limit = 20.0000 GPM PASS
NOx = 1.7517 GPM limit = 2.1000 GPM PASS

2nd test

HC = .0251 GPM limit = .9000 GPM PASS
CO = .0263 GPM limit = 20.0000 GPM PASS
NOx = .0031 GPM limit = 2.1000 GPM PASS

On the second test, it fast passed.