Well, after a lot of different people telling me what would be the right thing to do, I have decided that I will just do what I please. So I will go ahead and install my headers myself. There is still one thing I am baffled by. The headers I bought are from lextasy and they eliminate the cats. I am a little worried about doing that. Not because removing cats on an everyday driver is illegal, but for the fact that I dont know what to expect by doing so. How many of you out there took your cats off? And for those of you that have, bad? good? alright? what?!?!?!

HELP!!!!

mat

 

Hi Mat;

I have both of my catalytic convertors removed, but my car is not daily driven. The advantages of having them removed improved power (HP & TQ) throughout and better gas mileage overall (21MPG now). In addition, your exhaust will sound noticeably louder than before when at higher acceleration, more of the V8 tune which I crave.

The disadvantages are obvious... Toxic fumes that come out of the exhaust will hurt the health of environment, yourself, and others being exposed...I have to keep my windows up, even in the summer time, to keep away the smell..Needless to say, it really does smell bad...Since my car is (1995) OBI and I have a private inspection shop for hookups, I can pass emissions without hassle..NY does not have very strict inspections on when compared to the strict emission regulated states like California. It will be important that you get emissions covered at your particular location. For OBDII generation cars, it's a totally different story...

-D

 

my 240 was straight piped... ( no cats jsut a straight through muffler and resonator....) and it sounds better and has much better flow... i NEVER noticed a smell.... but hey if you want performance get rid of the cats..... the only thing thats negaticve that i can thnink of is it may be too loud if you dont have some good mufflers... but i like loud... so it never bothered me....

 

i went fully gutted once and althought car got a little faster and was breathing better, it was smelly as well and ran a little rich. i also hated the fact that the noise was rattling ricer annoying and i lost low end power. so i got some smaller resonators put back in as well as a high flow cat, now i love the sound of my car, no emission passing problems (although i somehow passed gutted also) and very little or no smell, still an improvement over stock with bigger pipes yet no girggling noises.

 

Beware guys! You might get away with a smog shop, but if you're unlucky and get pulled over, you may get a big citation for driving without the cats. I've seen some Highway Patrol smog inspection setups on the streets that pulled everybody in for inspection. It's even better if you get a ticket for a custom turbo set-up than without the cats.

 

well until i joinded this site, i have never heard of emission or highway smog patrol....i guess new orleans doesnt really matter what happens to it in the future...lol...but umm more about this smell and loss of low end power. So you do get a bad smell? I mean is it that bad of a smell? or not? and how much high end power are we talkin? Like power in 3rd gear?

 

Low/high end is not determined by gears, it is by RPM. Gears simply change the torque values of the car. 4000 RPM+ is considered high end.

By smell, it smells like unburnt fuel and burned diesel. Its unpleasant, but you get used to it after a while.

Nonetheless going catless was probably the best mod I did for my car. When I was NA of course.

- D