Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting what cuases that sulfur smell @ 3K + rpm

Every time i rev my car passing minivans, or luaghing at civics, i get a very harsh sulfur smell, car runs perfect, although i do only get 250 miles to the tank. I did a search and most people have said its due to a bad cat, i just want to make sure that it can't be anything more serious, and find out if its covered under ford's warranty. my car has 43,000 miles on it (check sig), and if so, can i take it to any ford dealership, even though i bought from a joe shmoe used car dealer?

SON OF A BIT....damn, i posted this topic first, and it said it had an error, so i went back and rewrote the post...sorry i normally hate people who double post.

Can't you just delete the other one since you posted it? And yes, it does sound like the main cat is the culprit in regards to your question.

I had this problem too. When I had my car on the dyno it was running really rich. After that it started smelling like sulfur under normal (slightly spirited) driving. I *****ed to Ford that something was wrong, but their computers told them nothing was wrong. They finally said that my MAF sensor was on the far end of the scale and that they really had to "fight the system" to replace it. After that it has run fine.

I figure my cat is bad now though from having raw fuel in it. Really hard to convince Ford to replace my precats and cat.

Its your cat.

Proabably running rich. Marginal O2 sensors or MAF causing PCM to put in more fuel than is needed and decreasing your mileage. Any CELs?

why yes....the CEL cycles on at least once a week. it just came on and thats what prompted this post. The car drives great so it has to be something emmissions related, but i wish i could get better MPG and drive without smelling like asss.

It?s not your cat (yet). At WOT you engine will go into open-loop mode. If your engine is running a bit on the rich side in closed-loop, then it will go way rich in open-loop, rich=smell.
Check the basics first, have the injectors
cleaned (not with the fuel tank junk), air filter, wires, and plugs. Do a scan for codes and check the O2 sensor(s) output. Also, the upper intakes on these cars tend to get very fouled up with carbon from the EGR. This can interfere
with the air fuel burn and produce a rich condition.

good luck
jeff

Get out from behind the Volvo you've been following.....

The sulfur smell indicates that at least one of your cats is working just fine, but that your car is running rich.

I would try to get the codes scanned. It could be due to one or more bad O2 sensors, as others have suggested. My car was making the sulfur smell for over a year before the O2 sensor became bad enough to trigger a CEL. After replacing the O2 sensor (bank 1 upstream, in my case), the CEL and sulfur smell went away and I passed the emissions test (back in Nov of '01) with flying colours. However, the smell has recently started coming back so I am going to go ahead and replace the bank 2 upstream sensor this summer.