franck0011

hi guys i got a 2001 nissan maxima 20th and i got a SES light P0430. I know its the precat that dont do its job properly. i dont want to change it, i dont care beacause in canada,quebec theres no Smog test like in the us so im thinking of putting a oxygen sensor simulator

i got california spec exhaust. i deleted my primary catalytic converter (test pipe) and i wanted to gutt the precat but the bank 2 look like a pain in the &?$@ to do . so i think i will leave it there and put some oxygen sensor simulator to get rid of the SES light

But i want to know if the bank 2 precat is bad (which is the closest to the exhaust ports on the manifold) does it can kill my engine ? like the QR25de (2.5 sentra seR,altima...) or i dont need to be scared with that ?

thanks

TunerMaxima3000

iTrader: (4)

I would find a way to gut the one in the Y pipe.

Deleting the main cat is silly and will only cause the car to stink, and if you have a cop riding behind you and he smells it and cares enough, you will be in big trouble.

Deleting the precats should be done at your earliest convenience. I need to do mine soon also (same setup as you). I am thinking broomstick for the one in the Y pipe.

george__

iTrader: (1)

@Tuner - does your daily driver have headers?

Brl24

George you consistently show how useless you are.

If there's a pre cat to gut, then there clearly are no headers... You idiot.

Please, spare us your useless and meaningless posts.

george__

iTrader: (1)

^
I'm talking to TUNER

memphisballer

iTrader: (7)

Franck0011.I just dealt with this code and even started a thread due to my stupid @$$ infiniti dealer recommending that I replace my MAF.Anyway there are 8 bolts holding the bank 2 cat(5 at the manifold,3 at the y-pipe) plus the 3 small 10mm bolts holding the shield on.You do not need an o2 simulator.Simple spark plug non foulers from autozone have worked for me for about 300 miles now as well as other members.No CEL.Im lucky because my bolts were not rusted to hell and if yours are not remove it,gut it and be done with it.I am cali spec also.

franck0011

@tunermaxima3000 ... like i Said, i live in canada,quebec and downtown theres plenty of fuc%#(%ing honda civic straight pipe that stink oil as hell and some enormous blue smoke as hell and police dont care about... maybe its silly in the U.S to delete your main Cat beacause i know that the law in the U.S are very strict.


@memphisballer... i dont really want to put a sparkplug non fouler beacause im scared to break the oxygen sensor, its look pretty welded in haha BUT i ill maybe give it a try to unscrew it. and for the bolt... my bolts look like toothpicks loll so it will need alot of work. i wanted to know if it dangerous to leave the bad precat..does it can harm the engine cylinder? beacause on qr25de the precat are most known to kill the engine but on VQ series i dont know ?. I really want to gutt the 1-2 banks but it looks like very hard to, i wonder if i can remove the 3 bolt at the bottom of bank 2 and try to take a flexible rod or anything and smash it through the cat?. i dont want to remove the upper bolt of the precat (big pain in a tight spot)

i will give it a try like you said for the oxygen "spacer''.

thanks for help

george__

iTrader: (1)

^
you Quebec people get to have cheap booze & no front license plates... LUCKY!

So is everyone saying doing header + y-pipe = the car will stink like crazy?

franck0011

hahaha yeah rear license plate and the beer is not so cheap loll. Just a lil question : does in the u.s the beer are 3% alcohol ? i heard that its the highest.. true? (canada theres 10.1% beer haha) And heyy .. youre LUCKY in u.s you dont have sh%#ty road with potholes after potholes every everywhere the asphalt recipe in canada is weak... it stay flat for 2 years and after that in the spring season you begin to see big cracks and little bump

and for your question i dont think that its stink a lot when you delete all of your cat.. its smells unburnt fuel. i was saying that in my town theres a lot of wrecked car and it beaten up as hell so he needs to put oil every tank fill up hahaa .. a lot of civic,integra,neon,volks.... some are very in bad shape they drive it like they stole it

george__

iTrader: (1)

^
I'm in Ontario

But I doubt there's only 3% booze available in the US

franck0011

oh okay... i doubt too... the guys that told me this was drunk muahahah

maxima.713

iTrader: (7)

Why does everybody say that a catless car will stink? My vq35 was catless since i got it and i never had that weird smell that everybody talks about. Even when i would go on a cruise with my friends they wouldnt complain.

Brl24

George it doesn't matter who you are talking to... It's painful.

+1 on the gutted cat(s) with an anti fouler, I'm going on 2 years/50k km's and no cel, but that may be a challenge if your fairly corroded.

Also, as far as I know it can be dangerous to have a bad precat, when they start to break down bits can get into the cylinders and cause damage to the rings etc.

I believe, having a good tune can help a lot with the stank, because gutted cats commonly are paired with other mods and can make you run rich. With no cats at all, even with a tune I think you would smell it regardless.

franck0011

lollll everyone now is talking about exhaust smell haha ..

well... i need to find a solution for my precat, i will try to unscrew the oxygen sensor (red wire) first so if im lucky i will order a spark plug anti fouler to get rid of the SES light and gutt the precat soon

i wonder if i will unlock a few ponies with the gutted precats , maybe clogged a bit...

and you guys know if i will get a louder exhaust sound ? i already got a 2.25 catback and test pipe .. i will keep my silencer in the exhaust tip if its too much hahha

thanks !

ps: @maxima.713 sweet ride i like the bumper lip and i wish to have my tinted windows like you

george__

iTrader: (1)

^
Make it louder!!

If you get a "fast-cat" is the smell even worse?

TunerMaxima3000

iTrader: (4)

I live in Ontario. laws are pretty much the same across the board man. there's very few places where you're allowed no Catalytic converters.

They don't take it lightly either.

Anyways. I have had no cat's on my G35 and it stinks, but not like unburnt fuel. It's like an open-header car, race car, or an old-*** car. It's not a nice smell. It's the by-products from the combustion process and it's nasty ****.

If you are smelling unburnt fuel in your car you need to get it tuned properly. You shouldn't smell unburnt fuel.

JWatZ

iTrader: (5)

If you're going to put in the work to gut the precats yourself, just go with headers if you have the coinage. Seems pointless to do that much work unless you have to pass a visual inspection yearly.

MerlotMaxima

Whats the best place to buy cats and pre-cats? I've heard horror stories of $250 cats bought off ebay only lasting 3-6 months.

JWatZ

iTrader: (5)

Maybe I'm wrong with this train of thought, but why even bother replacing a precats? From what I understand they only serve a true purpose for the first 5 or so minutes the car runs. After that the main cat is functioning. Am I wrong?

Cheaper to gut and sim/anti-fouler. And still cheaper to do headers than replace precats.

TallTom

For precats, I would only buy Eastern or OEMs. The only other options are to gut or replace with headers.

For a main cat, I will probably buy a FastCat when the time comes.

TunerMaxima3000

iTrader: (4)

I would agree with this. I see no purpose in replacing the Precats. Get rid of them, they are nothing but a problem.

MerlotMaxima

I know a lil bit bout exhausts. you can replace the precats with headers? The 3.5 doesn't have headers already?

TunerMaxima3000

iTrader: (4)

Headers as in Aftermarket Headers.
Stock exhaust manifolds are referred to traditionally as exhaust manifolds.

Aftermarket performance Headers are traditionally called headers.

Headers replace the Y pipe and the old exhaust manfolds, in this process, the Pre-cat's are both eliminated.

MerlotMaxima

I gotcha, that makes sense. So how does that effect the "SES"? Once you install headers, what happens to the pre-cat o2 sensors.

Don't mean to jack the thread but I fried my cats so I've been thinkin bout gutting the whole exhaust and getting a full stainless steel Cattman system to get rid of my SES.

TunerMaxima3000

iTrader: (4)

The best way IMO is using the 90 ° non foulers. Some googling will lead you to what non foulers are, how they work, what they look like.

Any questions after just post

JWatZ

iTrader: (5)

IIRC, Vibrant makes some nice curved non-foulers that allow the O2's to fit rather nicely.

george__

iTrader: (1)

Can I find this locally in town?

Amerikaner83

iTrader: (17)

if you searched google you would find that yes, you can likely find them at any auto parts store.

DennisMik

iTrader: (2)

e-bay link

http://www.ebay.com/bhp/o2-sensor-spacer

ColombianMax

iTrader: (7)

Lord knows I wish this statement was 100% true. Its the reason why I dont have coilovers lol

You can drown in Chicago potholes when it rains!

TallTom

LOL, true. I thought Philly roads were bad, until I moved to NYC. I bottom out with H&R springs and tokico blues.

franck0011

@colombianmax muhahahahahaah me too im stock for the suspension

@memphisballer YOUR RIGHT ! ... the oxygen sensor was so easy to unscrew i was really surprised i will take your advice (spark plug anti fouler) and for the front precat YES its done.. i remove the 6 bolt at the top and the 3 at the bottom my worst parts was 1 stupid bolt in the ''triangle flange'' (bottom) the head was round bigg PAIN. i was not so equipped in special tools so its took me long time for this bolt.

the bad precat was cracked !


after


the rear precat is still there.. i tryed to gutt it by the oxygen sensor hole , no chance .. i will check that another time

memphisballer

iTrader: (7)

Hey man Im glad it worked out for you.Did you remove that bottom wire mesh/cap thats in your last pic?You didnt need that either.In any case its fixed.Check your clearance for the 90 degree antifouler.I didn't go that route due to looking at how tight that space is in there and possibly not being able to spin it on so I stuck with the regular anti foulers.

franck0011

memphis .. You talk about the lil grill that is between the "ceramic" and the "precat housing" ?? I throw it to the garbage haha ... Well i think thats what you talking, i removed all the metal ring in there. If you look closely, its just some dirt that looks like the little grill\mesh and the bottom ring look like is there but its not . I even removed the heat sheild around the precat (outside) its was all rusty and loose (i HATE exhaust rattle its anoying )

and advice guys dont forgot to put the little 10mm bolt back in !!!! Or you will get some leaks haha, i was not pay attention to this and right when i was ready to bolt my precat i saw this tiny holes hahaha

5aprilc

Most beer in the states around 5% or 6%.

franck0011

the car feels good hahha.

bank 2 gutted precat (still got the ''y-pipe precat") and Ebay catback ...dont buy no name catback, after 1 year of driving, the 'thing' in the muffler fart can (isolation) was trying to get out of my exhaust, and was near to clogged my muffler... i removed all my ''isolation'' from the fart can and mann, this is a stupid loud exhaust lol

-bank 2 precat gutted with still the bank 2 precat on
-megan racing test pipe (resonator)
-3 pieces catback with empty fart can
-stock airbox (lol)
-silencer tip removed in the exhaust tip

still got the 16" resonator in the catback and ...yeah its a little bit 'raspy' or mettalic sound but my phone sucks haha ... the sound is insane


ps: sorry for my bad english i hope that you understand hehe

franck0011

-UPDATE- i finnaly never put spark plug anti fouler, and last week i cleared my SES light and it NEVER came back haha... I think the oxygen sensor started to get some good carbon deposit coat on it so he "think" that my precat is okay haha im lucky

5aprilc

I've never used non foulers or O2 Sims, after installing my Y Pipe and Walker Pre Cat, and I've not once had the CEL come back on for either P0420 or PO430. And I'm California Spec Too. Every time I go for inspection, the emissions checker shows that my O2's aren't set, but it still passes.

So I don't think you're gonna need either one.

franck0011

your right ! ... i never had any code for the bank 1 (y pipe) i finnaly gutt it...

this is the y-pipe precat (this pic is to show how different the bank 1 is)

WARNING this is so tough and PAIN to gutt

5aprilc

I never gutted my Y pipe, I just bought one of Warpspeed's pipes, and called it a day. The car sounds awesome now.