What made the cats break? Are these cats known to fail? If not then I would be concerned about why both cats failed? Running too hot (I.E. too much or too little fuel)?

 

I purchased this Speedtech exhaust 2nd hand so who knows?


Yes the shop I had it at said they checked it, but the 1st time they only unbolted own side of my Speedtech cats and it looked fine. It was the other side that was damaged. I know they should of check it properly the 1st time, being it is the Speedtech system and it is a modular system, so it is very easy to take off and check both sides. This was frustrating thinking I could of have my car sooner, but decided to take the route of just being grateful it is fixed.

Thanks

Bobby Ali

ba

 

Cats will not fail catastrophically like this unless they are exposed to a running issue. Cats are known to fail in this manner when a car is running too rich and unburned fuel is passed into the red hot cat where it then ignites, causing termperatures in excess of 2000 degrees. Also, this system was recently purchased used, so anything could have gone on it it's prior life to weaken the cats...IMO, at some point these cats were exposed to abusive conditions leading to the failure. This is certainly not a normal occurance with our or any cats!

 

Yup, that is basically what I was getting at. If the issue was caused by the old owner then there is nothing to worry about for the new owner. If not then I was trying to point out that the root cause of the failure should be looked into so other issues do not come up.

 

I have a very similar dilema w/my car.

I noticed that my exhaust sounds muffled and i'm definitely down on power. Car boost perfectly fine to 1.2 bar. I'm running a catless exhaust and it basically sounds like something is blocking it when driving or even free revving. No CEL's or idiot lights are on in the dash. All my boost hoses are connected and tight. Plugs have less then 1000 miles on em.

I'm dumbfounded on what it could be, any suggestions?

Plugs are new

 

I have recently been told by a very reliable source that some not all but some unleaded race fuel is being made with enough lead to create a chemical reaction with the palladium and platinum in the cats which will lead to desentigration issues. This is occurring with some brands of high octane race fuels.

In today's world of litigation of course neither they nor I want to openly say an manufactures name. So suggestions if running race fuel. First contact the manafture of the fuel you are using talk to the tech department and ask them point blank if their product has any lead. No matter what they say get a copy of the analysis and mixture spec sheet and look for the lead levels yourselves. The other option is to pull the cars or buy a new Charles's system, of course this renders the car track deducted from what I understand about smog rules.
Bottom line their are a number of rules out there that have not tainted the performance curve with lead, find and use those. I'm sure a few calls to the tech department of this brand will cause a reformulation.

Just my two cents worth, I will be contacting our formulation company and getting a clear bill which we will post.