Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Bad Cats

Hey guys. I got a 98 SE Sport V-6 5spd with only 55,000 miles. I work for a ford dealer here in Jersey. I got a CEL about 2 months ago. No differece in power just bad gas milage. Me and another mechanic just got around to hooking it up to the computer and we got a cat efficiency code. Good news, Bad news....Bad news is that this is about a 2500.00 job. Good news....It's all covered under the Governments 8yr/80,000mi emissions warrantee. So I pay nothing. This job changes both cats, both o2 sensors, all gaskets and hardware and one other sensor in the system. The parts were ordered today and the job will be done monday. Maybe this will help some of you. Phil

Whoa...tell me how this one works. I've been noticing pretty bad mileage and am gonna get an intermittent CEL checked out this weekend, but my car's got 75K miles on it. You say it's a govt. warranty? What do I need to do to benefit from it?

You're lucky. I had my cats go bad at 131,374km (81,600mi). In Canada, the emission warrantee is 130,000km. Refused warrantee coverage by the dealer, Ford Customer Service, and even after I wrote Ford of Canada.

I had the repairs done at the dealership because I thought Ford would cover me at least partially. Big mistake. I'm going to try one more round of letter-writing.

Any tips on getting a positive reponse out of them?

Thanks,
Craig

BlacknBlue just asked me by Private Message what the symptoms were when my cats went bad. I would reply by PM, but BnB has them turned off in his profile.

Symptoms included general loss of power, but unless you're testing or timing your 1/4 mile, how much power is lost is dificult to figure, and it really plays with your mind. Eventually, I knew something was definitely wrong when the PFE tube blew off the fitting under heavy acceleration. Had a new one reattached and clamped, and it blew off again. With the PFE tube blown, the 2.5L Mystique gets blown away by mopeds, speedwalkers, and your gandmother's electric scooter. It's dangerously slow to drive, and will not make it up hills.

Heck, for me I wouldn't be able to tell. I've had my V6 for less than a month and drove a Zetec for two years prior. My six might be consistently underpowered and I'd never be able to tell.

Gotta get that code reader tomorrow...