here's the story. 4 weeks ago my driveshaft decides to go. My car has been sitting at home ever since then. i just got back from college this weekend and decided to install my cold air box i had just made. So i hook every thing up and crank it up. It started but was idleing really low, like barely 500 rpm. i thought it was kindof cool, sortof sounded like a perifreal port. Then i figured maybe the box was too restrictive and it was choking the engine not getting enough air, so i took the top of the box off and started it up again. same idle. then smoke started coming from the engine bay. shut it down quickly and did a visual inspection with a hose in hand. nothing. i couldn't find anything burning. i then sat in the car and smoke was coming up from around the gearshift. i looked under the car and the front cat was glowing orange. this is the only cat i have that is not hollowed out. is this cat clogged too? does my car have extreme problems? i am going to buy a rb header back exhaust as soon as i get the cash. will this solve the problem or is it more than that? thanks

 

I have a couple orange cats running around by my house too.

how do I get rid of them?

 

Yes, it sounds like your cat is clogged. Hollow it out like the rest and it will be fine. That would also indicate the low idle, because it just can't force the exhaust gasses through fast enough to let the engine run faster.

 

V8kilr,
The cats should be under the car near the exhaust, not inside where they cause damage/messes. If you totally remove the cats, your car is more susceptible to mice or chipmunks. Just get them spayed/neutered.

 

The cats should be under the car because you ran over them.

 

Ah ic ic, well then good point I will keep the orange cats and possibly spray paint them black.

I like the way black cats look.

 

Well, from your description of the CAI install, before you go pounding out the expensive innards of your pre-monolithic catalytic converter, take a second and find out if you've somehow restricted the airflow leading into the engine with your Cold Air Intake system.

The engine running rich can be caused by many different factors, including a poorly tuned carb, needle valves that won't seat correctly, an INTAKE AIR RESTRICTION, or even a problem with fuel pressure from the pump. Since fuel must be mixed with air in a 14.7:1 ratio (air/fuel), then anything more than that will not burn the fuel completely, resulting in all that unburned fuel being expelled into your exhaust system to be consumed - this unburned fuel burning in the exhaust is what causes cats to glow orange.

This is not a good thing.

Try removing your CAI setup and see if the problem mysteriously goes away. Could be that your supposedly freer-flowing CAI hookup is actually restricting airflow and causing a rich mixture problem. HTH,

 

like i said. after the problem occured i removed the top of the box and then started the car. i don't really think that there would be a restriction problem with the top of the box removed. i placed my hand on the filter and it was sucking in air just fine. this leads me to belive something else is the problem. i am going to remove the exhaust after the header this weekend and see if it affects anything.

 

that'll be loud as hell

 

This weekend I tried to start the car after installing my new Mallory Comp 70 fuel pump with a regulator.. My car ran, it ran at 2.5kRPM once I finally got it started... but the cat did start to glow orange.

I thought it was because the cat was clogged, but some guys in the Canadian section think it could have been running really lean or really rich.. I don't see how really lean could do it, but my mechanic said reall rich could definitely do that. In my case the glowing cat caught the exhaust manifold on fire because there was some old caked-on oil there. I put the fire out, towed it to my mechanic and am waiting to hear back.

As soon as I get word as to what was causing MY cat to glow orange this weekend I'll let you know. Hopefully the solution to my problem will help you out.

Jon

Edit: Run the car for short periods of time with cool-down time in between and try to adjust the fuel mixture screw of the carb. Are you running the stock fuel pump or an aftermarket one? If you're running an aftermarket one are you running a regulator?

If you're running rich, it's probably a fuel mixture screw problem, otherwise your cat is clogged. If you're gonna take any of the exhaust off, you should take off the cat in question and look through it. If you can see through the honeycomb, it's clear. If it looks all melted, it's clogged.

 

looking for your cat? check my treads

 

thanks for the advice vipernicus42. my car is fuel injected though. and i have no idea how the air fuel ratio would have gotten screwed up, unless sitting affected it somehow. like i said i have ran my car with my box i fabricated and it ran fine. no idea what caused the problems this time. i did go out and try to start it today and it was flooded. def inatly running rich.