Should I gut the cat?

[John84GN]

I know ALL the plus's of no cat or a gutted cat, but what are the downsides to doing this. Obviously Buick had a reason for it, so, gut it, or buy a high flow one? (I want to stay as legal as possible)

 

[Buick From Hell]

Actually, other than some air turbulence, I don't think ANYONE on this board could come up with a "downside"! Mine plugged up on me about 8 years ago, it's been hollow ever since, and it's never failed an emissions test.

 

[TType84]

kevin is right, for a true perfect solution (and still legal appearing) you would need to just get a 2.5" or 3" section of pipe.. and an old cat, slice the cat's shell in half and then weld the shell back around the 2.5" or 3" pipe.. it can easily be done, this way you have no turbulence to worry about. In my case, I just unbolt the cat from the downpipe and it leaves about a 1" gap.. if you had a cop that really cared enough to try to give you a ticket for it being unbolted you could always just say something like 'oh wow.. the bolts mustve fallen out when i hit that rock last night!' ..or something stupid like that. either way.. gut it or take it off. I looked at a site last night and they gained nearly 15-20rwhp with a test pipe / cutout, over stock exhaust with cat.

 

[turbowrenchhead]

The only reason for a cat convertor is for emmisions. It is designed to burn any hydrocarbons left over from the combustion process. As long as your engine is running correctly you should be able to pass without it. If you are running to rich. Just turn down the fuel pressure a little for the test.

 

[REDS HOT AIR]

GUT IT

dont have to worry about emmisions in va.

 

[John84GN]

COOOOOOOL...thanks guy's, turbowrenchhead, that thing abou the fuel pressure is pretty cool Thanks, I think I've made my decision

 

[alb84]

Don't forget to put the stock chip in before any emissions tests. the only real downside to gutting you cat is that it is a federal offense. We all know they don't have the money to follow up on all but a few cases, but if I were a fed, and wanted to make a few hundred easy emissions busts to make mt record look good . I'd just log on to all the popular car sites and start takeing names. I have a high flow cat, and a dump tube for the track. Even if by chance I had a 3in pipe straight through my cats shell I would'nt tell anyone on a public forum. But if I decided to ignor the law, I would us the 3in through pipe method for the best results. Later.....Danny