exhaust leak advise needed

[biggon71]

Ok here is my story,

At the beggining of the summer (late may probs) on the way back from a long trip, we bought some bad gas from a shady gas station. The car misfired and acted funny for a few weeks, but then began acting up only every now and again. I thought it was still the bad gas being worked out, so I ran the car until it was past 0 on the info-center and filled back up with good shell gas. Well the car still acted funny, so I changed the spark plugs and wires which solved the problem because the old spark plugs were worn down, overgapped and nasty.

But the next problem now is because I drove the car so much and it misfired so much, there is an exhaust leak in the first Cat for sure, but maybe elsewhere, Im not sure. What are my options for this?

I know many people cut their cats off, and I would actually like to do some aftermarked exhaust now. So please advise me on what I should do.

Thanks guys,
Biggon71

(I forgot if it is in my end caption but my car is a 2000 mountaineer 5.0)

 

[MercuryMullet]

My aftermarket exhaust keeps the first two cats for the computer. I had an rubber tube come off my erg. sounded horrible. I just plugged it back in. IMO either find all the leaks and try to fix each one or take it to a shop to see how much an aftermarket exhaust would be and how much to fix what is leaking at the same time.

 

[pbnj22]

try to find the leak for sure.. you said you think its a cat. on these vehicles the passenger side manifold is known to crack, bolts tend to back out gaskets break down etc... doe syour exhaust leak "quiet" down after engine is warm?

 

[biggon71]

to tell you the truth, I dont hear much, I just saw a pretty good amount of smoke coming off the passenger cat. At first I thought a spark plug wire was touching a manifold or something making the smoke, but it wasnt.

I ran by my local shop, he said $210 for a cat job. If I can get him to straight pipe it I will, If not I will probs just throw a flowmaster up there.

To find the leak I heard you can do a seafoam and look for smoke under the car. I might do that too.

 

[Turdle]

Smoke coming off passenger cat--are you sure it wasn't "steam"

As in a coolant leak dripping on the cat? Are you loosing any coolant at all?


In any event, there should not be smoke. If the cat is bad, it was killed from an upstream smoke source. If you have a smoky exhaust, it will not be cheap to fix.

 

[biggon71]

It could have been steam but idk. The check engine light came off after the plugs and wires but then came on again. I went to autozone and he read p0171 and p0174 (sytem too lean bank 1 and bank 2). I will have the car checked out by a mechanic before I proced any ehaust mods.

 

[JusTheUsual]

try to find the leak for sure.. you said you think its a cat. on these vehicles the passenger side manifold is known to crack, bolts tend to back out gaskets break down etc... doe syour exhaust leak "quiet" down after engine is warm?

They are?! My sound is coming right from the manifold/manifold gasket! I cant figure what else it would be and didn't want to take it apart yet. You are sure that right manifold is a known issue of cracking? If so that is definatly got to be my problem, $70 for right manifold and gasket through advance(without discount) and that's for a 99 v6 ohv xcode. Also now its starting to start up rough like chug to start up but then runs fine. Would that be a cracked manifold doing that?

 

[pbnj22]

They are?! My sound is coming right from the manifold/manifold gasket! I cant figure what else it would be and didn't want to take it apart yet. You are sure that right manifold is a known issue of cracking? If so that is definatly got to be my problem, $70 for right manifold and gasket through advance(without discount) and that's for a 99 v6 ohv xcode. Also now its starting to start up rough like chug to start up but then runs fine. Would that be a cracked manifold doing that?

i thought you had a v8! ... it is common on the v8s but i see now you have a v6 so i cant speak to that and common failures.. but if you have a "ticking" sound under load and it gets louder with more load on engine and it is louder on start up than when engine is warm it could most certainly still be a exhaust manifold leak..

 

[JusTheUsual]

gasket not header/stock manifold. ordering new gasket. DONT BUY CHEAP GASKETS FOR THESE PARTS! Less than a year old and only less than 10k miles on it.

 

[biggon71]

Im having mine checked out by our family mechanic tommorow, so we will see if it is something I can do myself or need to have them do it.