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That is illegal, and no shop would touch such an assignment, and chance losing their license, and perhaps some jail time..
Sure, it's illegal, but people with performance cars have been doing it for ages now with no problem. I pulled the cats off my Mustang GT and replaced it with an off road H-pipe within 2 weeks of ownership, and in 5 years I've never even had a cop look at the car with the stink eye...even with the 2 chamber Flowmasters.
Almost any exhaust shop will do this as well. Midas did the same mod on my good friends GT.
He'd be much better off getting an after market Catalytic.
And that would be my advice to the original poster get an after market Catalytic Converter. Actually they are much cheaper than what your mechanic quoted. Google it online. Installation should be no more than $150 and even at that price they are making a decent profit.
That leads to the point about getting what you pay for.
An aftermarket cat might not have enough material in it to do a good enough job that the engine computer likes that enough.
Or someone is having a fire sale on palladium and platinum that we don't know about.
Almost any exhaust shop will do this as well. Midas did the same mod on my good friends GT.
You ask a muffler shop in California to do something like that, and they will not only show you the door, but they will lead you to it and kick your butt out in a quick hurry.
They can lose their license to operate, the length of time depending on how serious and how many illegal operations they have preformed, and if serious enough, they will do jail time.
There are "Anti-tampering" laws in this and most states. I'd be amazed if that doesn't hold true in Florida, also. If the laws are lax in Florida, that will soon be changing, so enjoy it while you can..! Florida sees the light - adopts California's emission standards
Of course no cop checked you out, that isn't their duty. Shops get caught when one of several agencies send in a test car to a shop to see if they are performing illegal acts. The state published a report every month, listing the people caught, and the fines and jail time for the infractions.
As far as the customer getting caught, they will get caught in the bi-annual smog check program. If you want to take of and re-install your converters every bother year, go for it. It's much easier to just obey the law...
There are "Anti-tampering" laws in this and most states. I'd be amazed if that doesn't hold true in Florida, also. If the laws are lax in Florida, that will soon be changing, so enjoy it while you can..! Florida sees the light - adopts California's emission standards
As long as there is no vehicle inspection, I'm not too worried about it. The manufactures can decrease the emissions all they want from the factory as long as we have the thriving aftermarket to supply us with the parts we need.
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As far as the customer getting caught, they will get caught in the bi-annual smog check program. If you want to take of and re-install your converters every bother year, go for it.
None of that here in Florida, so no worries there. Even then, replacing the mid pipe is a few bolts and hour or so of time spent.
If it needs a new catalytic converter at only 90K miles, that often indicates there's something else wrong upstream causing too much unburnt fuel to enter the exhaust stream such as insufficient spark or loss of compression in one or more of the cylinders -- presuming the "bad cat" diagnosis is accurate. You should look into that or you may be replacing your cat again soon.
Also, you should be able to pick up an aftermarket catalytic converter for WAY under $500. I recently found a direct-bolt-on replacement for my Volkswagen for $150. Be careful of the "generic" replacement cats though; those usually require some customizing to get them to fit the original exhaust hardware. Make sure it's a direct bolt-on replacement specifically for your year, make and model.
If you're concerned about passing emissions with an aftermarket cat, many have an emissions warranty for a certain period, typically 25,000 miles or so.
It seems the economical approach I can take is to buy a DIRECT-FIT after market converter and get it installed. So, my doubt is which one should I buy ? I see cats of many many companies listed on the net. Which one should I go with ?
Before you decide you have the right answer to the problem, are you certain that the cat is actually bad, not just O2 sensors? I can easily beleive your original O2 sensor(s) are needing replacement at 90K, but I personally have an 87 Camry with the original cat still working very well at 225K
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