I have been smelling rotten eggs for some time now and I can feel the vibration of the exhaust now so I have two options, the fist is the expensive one... which is get a new cat... the second is what I have always done with my trucks which is to punch them out with a hammer and pipe, Now I have been told different things about doing this some said it will run bad if I do that cause it will throw the 02 sensor off, others have said it wont affect anything... what are you experiences with this? the van is a 03 e-150 5.4L... thanks guys

 

if it is the front cats that went bad then you need to get new ones but the real question is why the cat went bad. If you have a vibration and a egg smell i would think you prob have a bad coil and it dumped fuel into your cat and made it go bad. jmo

 

I will check that out... thanks for the pointers

 

I've always beat them out two but probably would only beat out the rears and replace the fronts

 

If you clean out the cats it will throw the check engine light on because you have downstream o2 sensors I would talk to an exhaust shop on prices for aftermarket cats

 

Compared to most things, cats are actually cheap in my opinion.
A great time to get free flow cats for better mileage and power.
I would replace rather than punch holes etc.
Removing cats is a $2,500 fine Federal offense (individuals) for each cat if the EPA finds out.

 

As another poster said, first find the problem that's making it dump fuel into the cat, then fix the cat.

If you replace prior to finding the original issue, it's just going to destroy a new cat conv.