So I already know the best thing to do is get rid of it because is bakes the engine bay. Now what I'm not sure of is if I have one. I purchased the car about 98% stock. I have a receipt from a past owner (car has been thru about 8 according to the carfax report the guy I bought it from gave me) for a down pipe install. I also have a receipt dated after the last one for a precat install. Now I looked and it looks like a down pipe, but there is a "bulge" at the end. Does anybody have a picture of an aftermarket precat? I've seen down pipes and i don't see the bulge I'm talking about but I'm curious if maybe mine might have one or if I have an aftermarket precat. I'll put some pictures up too hep.

 

Here are some pictures, it's looking like a precat may have been welded onto the aftermarket down pipe after I actually took some time too look at pictures.




Im kind of surprised it passed CA smog. I work at orielly auto and we get a lot of people coming in saying that the rite letter isn't stamped on their cat and they won't pass smog.

 

Doesn't look stock from the pictures. Here's the stock pre-cat. The top connects to the turbo exhaust and the bottom connects to the main cat.

 

edit

 

So if this is a cat that is welded on do you think it's fine to leave it there for awhile since its that far back. I'll still probably replace it but if it can wait for a little longer than a stock cat I'll probly just let it stay for the time being.

 

Are you sure you don't have a catless down pipe?

 

since you're in CA, and the visual part of our smog has the guy looking for 2 cats, it is possible that someone put a cat in the downpipe, just to pass that part of the smog test. nowhere else in the world would anyone do this, except maybe the SCCA.

 

Yah as much as I love living here all the laws can be frustrating. But I guess emission laws do help even if it's a corrupt system but that's for another thread. Now does anybody think that having the cat that far back would fix the cat baking the engine bay problem.

 

If it's just there for the visual, quite possible it's gutted.

 

Why don't you just ask the last owner???

 

To put it nicely, he didnt know anything. He took it to a rotary shop in Pleasanton and basically said work on it.

 

having the cat that far back probably does fix the baking engine problem, or as much as its going to. the factory cat is like 40lbs of iron, so it can store a lot of heat. yours wont, even with the cat

 

Now I see why it bakes the engine bay, that's a lot of metal. So I guess I won't need to worry about changing it out any time soon and can concentrate on other mods. Thanks guys.