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Hi Car Gurus....very serious question here and looking for opinions.
My check engine light came on, code P0420. The shop said my catalytic converter is essentially shot and the two oxygen sensors are corroded or melted into it. They quoted me $1700ish for the replacement.
I almost had a heart attack.
First of all, this is a 2003 Honda CRV, 189,000 miles...I know you will need to know that. There have been no major issues with the car and until this, it has always run perfectly. In fact, it still runs the same, except the check engine light is on.
The question is, do I pay for this? Get a second opinion? Take the $1700 and put it down on a new car? (I don't really want a car payment and I love this car) Any other suggestions?
Thanks for your help. I know nothing about cars and usually my cousin, who is a backyard mechanic and works on his race cars does my basic maintenance.
Get a second opinion. It's been 7 or 8 years but I had one replaced on my 2002 Monte Carlo SS under warranty. While I didnt have to pay for it, the bill showed the charge as being around $900. I'd find it hard to believe that a Honda would e twice the price. At any rate, if you are looking at over $1500 I'd get a second opinion regardless.
BTW I would think your cousin could install it now? Maybe buying the part and having him do it would reduce it even more.
Hi Car Gurus....very serious question here and looking for opinions.
My check engine light came on, code P0420. The shop said my catalytic converter is essentially shot and the two oxygen sensors are corroded or melted into it. They quoted me $1700ish for the replacement.
I almost had a heart attack.
First of all, this is a 2003 Honda CRV, 189,000 miles...I know you will need to know that. There have been no major issues with the car and until this, it has always run perfectly. In fact, it still runs the same, except the check engine light is on.
The question is, do I pay for this? Get a second opinion? Take the $1700 and put it down on a new car? (I don't really want a car payment and I love this car) Any other suggestions?
Thanks for your help. I know nothing about cars and usually my cousin, who is a backyard mechanic and works on his race cars does my basic maintenance.
Christa1024--
You can get a catalytic converter for as little as $50 if you shop around - pull one from a junkyard car, install an aftermarket one, etc. Have your cousin install it. $1,700 for a catalytic converter is asinine.
Plus, depending on your car, most of them have two O2 sensors - one upstream, one downstream. The upstream one is likely the one the car uses to adjust the air/fuel ratios. The downstream one is likely just making sure the catalytic converter runs properly.
Also, if your state doesn't have inspections... catless is always an option.
Second, third, get multiple opinions if necessary! Do not up and replace your cat on the advice of one shop who may or may not really know what they're talking about. (And even if they do, appears to be on the high side for price even for a factory part.)
P0420 means "catalyst efficiency below threshold". Now it has to have sensors, including and particularly the oxygen sensors, to measure this. So it's entirely possible that one of the sensors alone will cause this.
Or, it's entirely possible for the problem to be intermittent. My own car has done this from I think fewer miles than yours, because it's been I think 3 years now that I've been nursing an intermittent P0420. My car is also a Honda product, a few years older than yours. The P0420 may not repeat for a period measuring in months sometimes. If you leave the check engine light on, it will reset by itself if the problem does not recur after x time. I don't know how long, but it takes at least couple weeks to go off for me if I don't reset it. At the moment it's been off for a few months.
Indeed, the first thing you might want to do is just reset the light and see if it happens again, and if so, how often. It IS possible for a catalytic converter to get plugged, but that will result in obvious issues with how the engine is running. At 189k, the cat CAN be a wear part so to speak, where it wears out and is no longer effective. But also at 189k, it is reasonable to wonder just how much money you want to sink into this. If you are comfortable nudging this along for a while, you could get more years out of this car perhaps without doing anything.
In your state, is there a required annual inspection where they care if the check engine light is on or check the emissions with a tailpipe sniffer? This is one thing that can be a bit of a pain if you try to nurse this along, but we have an annual emissions inspection here and I've passed it at least 3 times with the intermittent P0420. I just have to make sure the light's not on when I go, and that the monitors are not more than one showing "incomplete". It will pass here with one incomplete. The scan tool that I use will show me the status of these. If your state actually does test the tailpipe output you may have trouble passing if indeed something is actually out of whack, but other than that you may be able to go forward doing nothing.
Even if you do decide you need to replace the cat, you can consider using cheaper parts. This can be tricky, though, if it needs to pass an inspection, because some aftermarket cats will not be effective enough to keep the check engine light off. Ugh. So, if you're going to run the car to 300k, you might want to get the real Honda part, which is going to be at least $1200-1300 for the part. You could consider buying the parts and having your cousin work on it, if he is confident enough to work on the exhaust parts. They do just bolt on, but sometimes there can be some issues getting the old stuff off if it's been on there long enough. I have used Curry Acura in NY a few times to buy genuine Honda/Acura parts, they do a good job and are one of the closest online parts dealers to me. CurryAcuraParts4Less If you're not going to keep the car another 100k miles or so, then you might try to get by with some cheaper parts for now. Or a junkyard pull or something. But only if necessary. The best way to squeak by for a little longer (and by a little I mean it could be another few years) is to try not to do anything.
Aren't those no longer supposed to exist because they would have been taken to a scrap metal yard and been melted down to get the platinum out? Without the platinum the catalytic converter doesn't work. Also the amount of platinum in the catalytic converter is more then 50 bucks if it is stolen from like a truck.
2000 dollars is ridiculous. They are over charging you. See if there is a BYOP place around and give them a call. A bring your own parts in other words. You can buy parts from them too and they don't do the markup on the parts nor the labor. It's a chain of auto shops or else a number of them decided to use the concept name, never used them before but they seem to always be busy.
You can try the removing your CC and looking in it....does it look melted, crushed or damaged in any way???
Once it is off, dump it in a bucket of hot, very soapy water....let it sit for 24 hours. Take the CC out and rinse very, very good. Then put it back into the clean, hot, soapy water again for 24 hours...remove and rinse. Reinstall your CC and keep your fingers crossed that all your work fixed the problem.
If cat was melted your car would lose a LOT of power. It would be the equivalent of a clogged sewer line. Start the car and feel the exhaust coming out of the tailpipe. Should be pretty strong with a pulse feel to the exhaust.
Probably bad O2 sensors. Get another opinion. Usually a bad cat will have a rotten egg smell or strong sulphur smell. Like a giant match being lit.
Holy crap. My 96 Suburban was just smogged with 222K miles and the original Cat and sensors and it passed with flying colors. I don't understand how a Honda, a supposedly flawless vehicle according to Honda lovers on here, already needs a replacement Cat?
Get it checked at a different smog place. When I had a 97 Tahoe I took it to one of these "pass or don't pay" places and it failed yet when I had it retested again at another shop it passed.
If cat was melted your car would lose a LOT of power. It would be the equivalent of a clogged sewer line. Start the car and feel the exhaust coming out of the tailpipe. Should be pretty strong with a pulse feel to the exhaust.
Probably bad O2 sensors. Get another opinion. Usually a bad cat will have a rotten egg smell or strong sulphur smell. Like a giant match being lit.
Some of your advice is correct, some of it is not. A strong sulfur smell from a catalytic converter does not mean the converter is defective. A worn out converter is not capable of producing a strong smell because a worn out catalytic converter is "dead" and does not promote catalytic chemical reactions. The strong smell means the converter is being overworked because of a problem upstream such as a misfire or incorrect fuel mixture. This smell is relatively rare nowadays because gasoline is formulated with minimal sulfur to avoid hydrogen sulfide emissions.
Don in Austin
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