If you suddenly smell rotting eggs while driving, it can be a little confusing. But the smell could indicate something a lot more dangerous than a few errant eggs: your catalytic converter might have broken down. Let’s take a look at five signs that you’ll need to visit your local Cadillac dealer for cat repair.
A Sulfur, Rotten-Egg Smell
When functioning properly, the precious metals inside a cat clean the noxious emissions that any car engine produces. These dangerous gases include nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, and hydrocarbons such as hydrogen sulfide.
This last gas – hydrogen sulfide – has a distinctively unpleasant sulfur smell similar to rotten eggs.
Metallic Rattling While Revving
The precious metals inside a cat include platinum, rhodium, and palladium. These metals coat a delicate honeycomb-like mesh through which the engine’s emissions pass on their way out of your car.
If any fuel or fluids leak into the exhaust system and reach the cat, they can corrode and break down the mesh, causing it to fall apart. Then, when the engine’s revving pushes air and gases through the exhaust, you might hear the loose parts of the mesh rattling around below you. Age and external impacts can also cause a cat’s mesh to disintegrate and start rattling.
Misfiring Cylinders in the Engine
Cats can sometimes become clogged up, which prevents air and gases from escaping through the exhaust system. This backup of airflow eventually restricts the inflow of oxygen into the engine’s combustion chambers.
When this happens, the combustion process becomes fuel-heavy, which can foul the spark plugs and lead to misfiring. As a result, you’ll hear your engine start to cough and sputter, and you’ll also lose engine power.
Black Smoke from the Tailpipe
The excess of unburned fuel created by misfiring will start to be expelled through the exhaust system. It will eventually emit from your tailpipe in the form of black smoke.
And when unburned fuel reaches the cat, it can sometimes ignite in the cat’s extreme heat. This instantly destroys the meshwork. You’ll hear a bang and see even thicker smoke pouring out behind your car.
Have Your Cadillac Dealer Diagnose Cat Problems?
When you take your car in for repairs, the technician first needs to establish if the engine issues are caused by a faulty cat or something else. A quick way to diagnose cat problems is to disconnect some exhaust piping upwind of the cat and then run the engine.
They’re also likely to measure the temperature of the cat and nearby piping with a pyrometer. If the inlet temperature is much higher than the outlet temperature, the cat has a problem.
Visit Earnhardt Cadillac today to have your cat inspected, repaired, or replaced. We’re an award-winning local dealership that puts our customers and their satisfaction above all else.
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