Okay, both gaskets on the cats have burned away leaving huge gaps and have made my Rex sound like a LOUD angry wasp. Auto Zone can get me two gaskets for about 10 bucks but I have several questions. Can I just remove the first cat and replace it with just a straight pipe, eliminating the need for these gaskets? Will this affect performance? And why do these cars need two cats? Thanks.

 

If you dont have yearly inspections then you can remove both. It will make the car a little louder but not to bad, This will also let you get rid of the air pump.

 

umm, you can get a peice of pipe to replace the lenth and width of the catalytic converted.

but unless you weld it, your still going to have to use flanges.


My catalytic converter is welded to that peice of pipe.

When I went to put on a new header, I had to get the pipe welded and cut a bit.

but the point is, its a pain.



the pipe was welded to the catalytic converter so I had to get somone to trim that pipe coming off the catalytic converter.

 

Customizing a straight pipe to replace the pre-cat will be more costly than replacing a couple of gaskets.
These cars have two catalysts because they are rotaries! Rotaries = stinky!