Originally posted by: funboy42
Originally posted by: udonoogen
Originally posted by: funboy42
Originally posted by: Pepsi90919
Originally posted by: funboy42
Because people dont notice anything till something else happends. He hit the rock and was expecting something bad. Never noticed it before now and because he "was looking for something to happen" his mind brought it up. I dont care if you too a hammer to the cat and dented the crap out of it. It wont make it "start" smelling like eggs. Its called sulfer and is a natural by product in oil. If hitting the rock did such bad damage it would of jarred the honey comb insides apart and clog it up resulting in extreme loss of power but no hitting a rock isnt going to start making it smell like eggs. People just do this. It could of been there for a long time his mind was just looking for a problem and noticed it and thats all there is to it.
And Im not talking out my ass either. Been workign on cars since I was 12 (now 34) co owned a Dealership till my father died, went to school for auto mechanics, ran and managed the service center for Dodge, Ford, and Pontiac along with several smaller shops. And the BS that the smell is a sign of your cat is failing is a trick to make people like this think that and bring it in to get fixed. It either works or it dosent and 99% of the time it fails from being old and comes apart and you will hear a rattle comming from it when you hit the exhaust. That or if your car is equiped with a sensor and it says the cat is bad then it is but all it is is a series of plates in a honey comb formation that produces a chemical reaction and changes the gasses from one form to another (water). There are no moving parts in it, there are no computer whatvers in it. It works or it doesnt. Alot of times the smell can also be because the car isnt running right such as a tune up ar failed EGR but for the most part if you smell Sulfer (smells like gun powder, fireworks, or rotten eggs) it is sulfer from the fule your smelling and some cats will produce the smell worse then others. You want it to go away buy another cat and waste your money but just changing stations, brand or octane levels will relieve the smell.
Linkage on how a cat works.
so you're saying that a rock opening a hole in or around the catalytic converter isn't going to make the gas more likely to reach the cabin than if it were to exit out the tail pipe at the back?
If the rock was to open the cat dont you think the op would be complaining more of the loud fvcking exhaust noise or the put put put he would be hearing from a small hole being opened in it? The smalles of a hole in the cat will produce a noise your sure to hear 100%. From a putting sound to full out loud as hell depending if the hole is to the front or rear of the cat.
So come on Im saying that rock hitting it wont make the smell. If he said I hit a rock and now when the car is running and I hear a "put put put" or the exhaust is really loud and he smells the eggs then I would of said you got a hole in the cat and thats whats making the sound but still stand firm on the smell. If there was no cat on the car there would be NO smell. But no he hit something and it is human for one to never notice this before and because something happened the mind is set to "I hit something so somethign will be wrong pay attention to every smell, squeek, rattle, ting, .....)
Hell if it was comming through his vents I would really say he was smelling the car infront of him that was producing the egg smell and his ac system was sucking the air from said car infront of him and because he hit the rock his mind was looking for something bad and thinks it is his.
Tell you what op. Start your car when you get the battery fixed. Stick your nose right to the exhaust pipe, or near it. If you dont smell eggs it wasnt your car. And pepsi been doing this sh!t for 22 years and Diag is my favorite part of the job so dont spit on me and try to tell me its raining outside. I was born at night just not last night.
the sulfur smell started yesterday, i swear. i drive with my car windows down all the time. i have never smelled it ever before. this smell was rancid and it was coming from the bottom of the car (driver side is worse) as well as through the vents.
battery always needs a jump when not starting it within 10 minutes of driving/parking. i took the car to walmart tire center and they took a battery reading. he said the battery was not a problem and that it might be the alternator (he admitted he was not too car savy though). i don't hear a put put put and the exhaust isn't abnormally loud. could i have damaged the catalytic converter? i drive a toyota camry solara 1999.
As for the battery I wouldnt believe them one damn bit. If the battery shorts out internally it will drain itself rather quickly AND can still show up as being good. A alt maintains the charge of the battery so if you can jump the car and drive all day with the lights on, radio blasting, fan for the ac on bringing in air that smells like rotten eggs and the car doesnt ever die out then your running pretty much right off the power the alt is producing. Again same as the cat the alt is working or its not. If it doesnt work your car would run off the battery till there is no more juice left in it then the car wont run at all. Even if you jmp it and get it start if the alt isnt producing juice once the battery is drained thats it.
So if the car is running after you get a jump and stays running then its not the alt at all. And since your saying it doesnt take long for the battery to die after you shut it off there really isnt many things that can cause a battery to die that quickly. If it was just a little wire short youd either pop a fuse or it would take longer then 10 minutes to drain it completly. The only thing that will drain it that quick is a defective battery that is internally shorting out. Spend the $50 and buy a new one and that problem is solved.
Again about the cat. Check out the link I provided and see how one is made. Your pretty much going to have to flatten the cat to damage it to the point it wont work at all. The smell you have is what you get from some cats unfortunatly (old or new cars right off the showroom floor. Try telling that to a customer that just plunked down $50K for his infinity and smells eggs from the exhaust on delivery). Other then trying different gas stations your only other option is to try a different cat. Going with another one is not a 100% sure thing for depending on the fuel and the cat it will still smell like eggs and your wasting your money. I am willing to bet though the smell has been there for ever but because you hit the rock your senses are hightened and your noticing it again. Also jsut thinking more and the fact your "getting: this smell through your vents when the exhaust is in the rear of the car would also lead me to think maybe what you hit wasnt a rock? A animal perhaps? A small skunk that may be logded under a car part? If it is a baby skunk it could of looked like a rock and wouldnt give a strong odor like its parents but it should would give a stink and it would come through the vents. But other then that I just dont know, how, if it is not comming from another car how it is not obeying any laws and the exhaust with the windows up and car moving is able to go foward infront of the car, through the hood or under it, to the air box, and make it into your car through the vents (sounds pretty damn silly especially since you dont have an exhaust leak). Again put your nose near the tail pipe and smell. If you got no egg smell comming directly out of that pipe but through the vents you got other problems.
SO again change your battery, remove the baby skunk from under the hood or botom of the car (if not a skunk could of some sort of dead animal found its way into the air box and need to have that cheked out), and if it is the cat you can either change gas stations, have a universal cat installed (Uni for $100 or OEM for $600 you make the choice on which is better to throw your money at), or just sell the car to some other sucker and buy another one.