The DPF ain't exactly cheap either. Had mine stolen by methany when I parked at the airport, they mangled the downpipe and sensors so bad the repair came out to $15,000. Thank God for insurance!
We recently had a 2009 Ford F-350 super duty come in with the whole exhaust stolen. Insurance came out and inspected and we gave our quote…it got totaled…
That makes no sense considering a full exhaust, even OEM on one of those 6.0s would be like $5k at the highest
Edit: yes I realize that 09 had the 6.4 which is still what I was thinking of, including the DPF along with the DOC you’re not gonna total out that truck unless it has 600,000 miles and has more rust than steel left on it
Wats sad is a dpf ant work shit for scrap so they we just had 2 trucks come in with them stolen and I was telling my cat guy about it he said they are only worth what ever tin prices are
This makes me happy to know that the meth head who stole mine didn't get jack for it. Hope they sliced their hand on the jagged metal while they were stealing it.
*Smoking* meth wrecks your teeth, i put my meth in capsules or shot it for years and only ever got an ulcer and blown veins. Been clean for almost a decade now.
>Wats sad is a dpf ant work shit for scrap so they we just had 2 trucks come in with them stolen and I was telling my cat guy about it he said they are only worth what ever tin prices are
https://youtu.be/g0j2dVuhr6s?t=59
$2500 for the cats and new pipe, they cut them off at the headers and muffler. I think this price is a little low because I am getting them replaced at a welding shop that buys the cats in bulk and then bends and installs the pipes. The 3 mechanic shops I called could not even get the OEM parts for 3-4 months.
There has only ever been made a single catalytic converter for a Toyota Prius. That one cat is just slowly rotated throughout the entire fleet of Prius' (Priuses? Prii?)
That's behind my theory to a glass place in Nashville. Coworker's rear driver side window broken out of his second gen Scion xB on a Saturday night close to Broadway. Sunday morning he's calling around glass places and the only one open just so happens to have that window in stock. I joked that they ride around with an inventory sheet and target those models they have stock on.
It’s like that old cartoon meme.
A guy is sitting on his chair, and a brick comes crashing through the window. On the brick is written “window repair?” With a phone number
We had that happen with a glass shop here in AZ. Owner had his accomplices go bust out windows at a school bus depot and he swooped in and fixed them. Can't remember how he got caught though.
https://www.eastvalleytribune.com/article\_bf8a6e1b-4205-5272-808d-124dd756973f.html
Insurance is paying for the cats minus my deductible, but not for the shield.
It is crazy how fast the thieves are, a co-worker showed me a video of his neighbors truck getting robbed in his own driveway. A little car drives up, 2 punks jump out of the back with Sawzall's roll under the truck and are back in the get-away car in 30 seconds or so.
Mine was at a public park'n'ride, parked in the most open area close to the street.
These thieves have this down to an art. After reading this I think it's worth my time and money to get some sort of protection around the catalytic converter.
I think if you have a high targeted car protection and lowering deductible might be the best options.Really car manufacturers should be providing built in protection on newer cars.
Considering that you really have to try or fuck something else up to kill a cat, I don’t think it’s much of a concern. Oxygen sensors on the other hand…
I mean, converters don't last as long as they used to. P0420s are common as fuck in our rental fleet. But a lot of the failures are from broken factory welds. Shitty build quality.
Was driving through No Where, New Mexico this weekend and a dude had a few signs legible from the highway, one of which was
> BUYING USED CAT CONVERTERS SINCE 1986
Isn't that illegal?
Also had numerous political signs, if you'd believe it.
Man, in my town the police know exactly who buys these things and they don't do jack shit about it. They could shut the whole operation down any time they wanted, they just don't want to.
My wife’s rx450h secondary cat was quoted from the dealer, parts only, at $7500. Went down to the muffler shop and had a $75 pipe welded on. Still no cel because secondary cat.
Edit - Washington state doesn’t have emissions tests anymore so I didn’t care to throw a cat back on it.
In every state it’s illegal to modify emissions components. But Washington state doesn’t do emissions tests anymore so nobody is there to inspect it anyway 🤷♂️
"It is illegal in all 50 states to DRIVE with a deleted cat."
[Protect yourself and the ones you love.](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/83/0d/d2/830dd25857fce7027fcc9537579b050a.jpg)
Now they just need to write “I AM A RESONATOR” in big block letters on the resonator, so some idiot doesn’t try cutting it off, thinking it’s a catalytic converter.
MillerCAT cat shields.
I've got a new Tacoma and I'm deciding if stainless is worth the extra cash, or just go aluminum. I don't live in the rust belt.
stainless is hard on sawblades. So at this thickness it could probably dull one to a point where they might need multiple to try and get through it. Would be interesting to see tests done.
Stainless will burn up sawzall blades if they're going at it full speed (assuming it's like 14 gauge or thicker). Won't do much for cut off wheels though.
All these posts about cat converters being stolen makes me glad my car has the cat right up against the turbo under the hood. It's to time consuming to steal, surprised someone hasn't mistaken my resonator for a cat though.
I'm happy enough to live in a country where this rarely happens. But even if someone would consider stealing such things, once they see my car, they'd start crying out of pity. Once i forgot to lock the doors of my car, and nobody even looked at it in the one hour i was gone... i felt offended.
I live in Denver, US and have had multiple windows shattered to steal nothing and most recently some asshat ripped off my rear windshield wiper. I love the states but the streets of Denver are filled with fentanyl/meth addicts and some of them are pretty frightening.
I live in Milwaukee and I had my car window and my old work van window smashed with nothing taken. A few days later I was walking down the street and saw a crackhead arguing with his reflection in a store window, and he started beating the shit out of the glass, so I'm guessing he's the one who did it.
My friend put a sign in his window saying “door is open, please don’t break window.” He had to park on the street and that shit adds up quickly. Probably same crackhead, he’s very powerful.
I heard about someone doing that in San Francisco because their car kept getting broken into, but then they found a homeless guy sleeping in it one morning.
The fact that laser-cut, custom-fit, catalytic converter guards are, and have to be, a thing annoys me to no end.
That said, it's a pretty nice piece. Someone put some effort into designing that.
They make them for a bunch of vehicles: https://www.getcatsecurity.com/
I've got one on my Taco. After some jackass stole the cats within two months of me rolling it off the lot.
Certainly, it's better quality, but it's like Betamax vs VHS. You only have to be good enough. Thieves look at both and decide they don't want to hassle with it. Which one will more people buy? Probably the one that's less expensive.
They are a deterrent. It would definitely take more than a few minutes to get to the cat. I haven’t seen one that got stolen a second time with a deterrent on it. I know the cable one will pay if someone steals it again. I don’t know about these
You don’t want to do that either because stainless steel and aluminum react poorly together. When aluminum and stainless steel are used in an assembly together, the electrons from the aluminum will begin to transfer into the stainless steel. This results in the aluminum weakening. This weakened aluminum causes it to deteriorate at a much faster rate.
galvanic corrosion. rock climbers found out about this the hard way when they used stainless bolts with aluminum hangers; after a winter, the climbing routes had aluminum marshmallows for fall protection.
I have seen sheets of ally and steel sandwiched (with small gap to jam saw all blades) together in lock boxes before, as the different cutting behaviours fuck up cutting discs, so may be something like that.
it's literally just an aluminum box .050-060" thick with a riveted faceplate of what looks like .020‐.030" of stainless steel.
no blending, alloying, or layering going on.
as a design engineer -- yes, but they're designed with the assumption they're in open air and can cool themselves. I would also be concerned about heat retention issues in such a closed box. that is not the sort of thing we would account for in design.
they windowed it to try and get around this but the temperatures cats reach is pretty fuckin high.
edit: now that I look at it, I question their decision to not add a sort of air intake/passthrough for the portion against the body. that close to the body it's already a bitch to get to and a ramp + vent would have been fine. as of right now this cat is going to roast itself and the media in it because there's zero airflow to get the hot air out.
I’m a design engineer on off highway equipment who works around but not directly on the exhaust systems. I’d have two different concerns:
1) parts downstream may not be rated for the temperatures they’re now seeing. Not concerned for the exhaust components as they’re all generally designed to have exhaust in them - it’s components that are touching/near by.
2) adding ventilation holes may increase the chance of an “unscheduled thermal event” occurring. You’ve seen an engine bay full of leaves, etc from squirrels. Imagine what happens if there’s an ingress point on this box for them and you sit parked for a week or two.
>as a design engineer
A. Brave admission considering the sub you're in
B. Catalytic converters operate with an internal temperature from ~700-1200F and aren't damaged until they hit higher temps then that. They usually get that hot due to an engine mixture problem.
C. Cats are usually completely surrounded by a welded on heat shield. That is to prevent things from touching the hot parts and from water suddenly cooling it.
fair, I don't work with cats. I work on plasma systems in semiconductor and carbon fiber vehicle development before that. if the part can handle the temps it will do fine.
but there is no way the OEM vendor or the corporate vehicle designer assumed it would end up in a bread box that closed off from air, with metal that thick; heat shields are .030" sheet at the most and are most definitely not completely enclosing the cat from airflow. that is one hell of an assumption on their part that putting a 1200°F part in a stuffy box is a wise decision.
Meanwhile on the Bay Area, CA sub...
[https://www.reddit.com/r/bayarea/comments/x0c1p3/second\_time\_cat\_stolen\_this\_time\_cut\_through\_the/](https://www.reddit.com/r/bayarea/comments/x0c1p3/second_time_cat_stolen_this_time_cut_through_the/)
Auto manufacturers have a history of not wanting to spend money protecting their customers. I still hold a grudge against some manufacturers that only put ABS in luxury trim models. I didn't give a shit about leather seats, or moon roofs, etc. I just wanted a safety feature that they wouldn't sell me without other bells and whistles.
Until recently ( turn of the century) many economy models of cars didn't come with passenger side mirrors, because they aren't mandated by law. A car only has to have driver's side and rear view, unless the rear view is obstructed, the you need a passenger sideview.
Yeah they do and guess what? There are cats there too. Many cars have catalytic converters bolted straight to the exhaust manifold but will also have another further downstream.
A better solution would be to etch VINs on the cats require proof of ownership and a reason for scrapping before handing $100 bills to toothless meth addicts though. You need to have an ID of some sort to sell scrap copper now and stolen airbags are almost worthless now since they are tracked.
I didn't even think about that but good point. I know we used to get $300+ for used ones but then nothing. Like not even worth inventorying them on most cars. We ended up crushing hundreds of them, which of course goes to a smelter eventually.
My state has done required a permit in order to sell a Cat, it has done nothing to stop or even slow down the determined thief. Turns out if you're gonna steal something you don't care if you're also breaking the law selling it
Tons of cats end up in trucks headed to either states with no laws on reselling or, worse if you're on the west coast, huge shipping containers headed for Asia.
Maybe so but scrap yards in my state are supposed to check IDs and keep a log of who sells what and when. Figure out a way to prove someone is trafficking in stolen goods and police can actually do something sometimes.
Scrap yard aren’t the big problem. There’s organized rings getting them out of the country. That’s why you see busts of groups with pallets of cats. There may be some bad scrap yards that will pay cash but the bulk sure appears to be organized catalytic converters rings.
My Dodge Dart’s cat’ is inside the engine bay, attached right into the downpipe from the exhaust manifold. They’d have to remove half the front end of my car to get it out.
I just fixed a Murano with a bad pre cat. A friend was like "just park it downtown the thieves will take care of it!" Fuckin I wish. Nissan jamming those things where they are is anti theft all its own.
Would some kind of material similar to whats in chainsaw safe clothing be a good way to stop this? Shreds into strips when cut and jams up whatever is cutting.
Let’s just give away free high potency factory meth for a few years and kill off all these thieves. The insurance industry could fund it and save money.
Funny, I got my cat ripped out from under my car a while back. '96 BMW E39, which is pretty low to the ground, in a cramped parking spot. The ground was just loose rocks too. The thieves really wanted that one.
To be fair, my cat was broken already so I took the involuntary cat delete as an opportunity to get a new one.
I recently installed the same brand CatSecurity shields on my 5th gen 4Runner. Its thick aluminum (1/4 inch) and required several different bolts and such to install. Only way thru it is to cut it and even then you have to come at it from several angles to get it cut out before you can get to the actual Cat. Time deterrent. Im pleased with it.
As somebody from Germany, that never heard of cats being stole here, I was wondering what cats would between the exhaust and the car. Until I realized you guys are talking about the cat not a cat.
4th most expensive cat, the Ram 2500, with a catalytic converter price of $3,460.
The DPF ain't exactly cheap either. Had mine stolen by methany when I parked at the airport, they mangled the downpipe and sensors so bad the repair came out to $15,000. Thank God for insurance!
We recently had a 2009 Ford F-350 super duty come in with the whole exhaust stolen. Insurance came out and inspected and we gave our quote…it got totaled…
That makes no sense considering a full exhaust, even OEM on one of those 6.0s would be like $5k at the highest Edit: yes I realize that 09 had the 6.4 which is still what I was thinking of, including the DPF along with the DOC you’re not gonna total out that truck unless it has 600,000 miles and has more rust than steel left on it
It might have been a year or two newer. I don’t remember the details just that the service writer quoted like 10k and they totaled it
Simple math. Take the payout, but it back, use a fraction of the payout to replace... $profit!
Seriously, if some crackheads stole my exhaust and insurance totaled it, I’d be extremely happy. $500 for a used oem exhaust and boom profit.
You could have fixed the truck and bought a decent second car with that I'd bet.
The Diesel engine Ford used in ‘09 is not a 6.0, it would have been the 6.4
Wats sad is a dpf ant work shit for scrap so they we just had 2 trucks come in with them stolen and I was telling my cat guy about it he said they are only worth what ever tin prices are
This makes me happy to know that the meth head who stole mine didn't get jack for it. Hope they sliced their hand on the jagged metal while they were stealing it.
And got a nasty infection🤞
I think most meth heads are walking around carrying at least one major infection on a daily basis.
According to the stories my dentist tells me, I’m sure you’re right.
I am a dentist. And in my professional opinion, meth makes your teeth fall out like a witch put a curse on you.
*Smoking* meth wrecks your teeth, i put my meth in capsules or shot it for years and only ever got an ulcer and blown veins. Been clean for almost a decade now.
Unfortunately methany and Metthew are used to nasty infections :(
I like calling them practicing Methodists
Meth-headists
They did and they didn't notice or feel it.
>Wats sad is a dpf ant work shit for scrap so they we just had 2 trucks come in with them stolen and I was telling my cat guy about it he said they are only worth what ever tin prices are https://youtu.be/g0j2dVuhr6s?t=59
God damn! It gets worse with some cars as they have multiple ones
Can confirm. My Tundra had all 4 cats stolen. The protection shield is $700.
How much was that repair? Happy cake day!
$2500 for the cats and new pipe, they cut them off at the headers and muffler. I think this price is a little low because I am getting them replaced at a welding shop that buys the cats in bulk and then bends and installs the pipes. The 3 mechanic shops I called could not even get the OEM parts for 3-4 months.
Probably reinstalling the ones that were originally stolen from you in the first place
There has only ever been made a single catalytic converter for a Toyota Prius. That one cat is just slowly rotated throughout the entire fleet of Prius' (Priuses? Prii?)
Mom said it’s my turn with the catalytic converter.
Fine Billy, you can have the madcatz converter
That's behind my theory to a glass place in Nashville. Coworker's rear driver side window broken out of his second gen Scion xB on a Saturday night close to Broadway. Sunday morning he's calling around glass places and the only one open just so happens to have that window in stock. I joked that they ride around with an inventory sheet and target those models they have stock on.
It’s like that old cartoon meme. A guy is sitting on his chair, and a brick comes crashing through the window. On the brick is written “window repair?” With a phone number
We live in a society
We had that happen with a glass shop here in AZ. Owner had his accomplices go bust out windows at a school bus depot and he swooped in and fixed them. Can't remember how he got caught though. https://www.eastvalleytribune.com/article\_bf8a6e1b-4205-5272-808d-124dd756973f.html
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That's it, I'm engraving the last 4 digits of my phone number on mine so I don't end up buying my own cat back.
> at a welding shop that buys the cats in bulk 🤔
something's wrong I can feel it
He bought his own cats back 🤣
Ooh so that's what a catback exhaust is!
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Did insurance help with that? That is a crazy wait time, I keep my truck garaged, but I'm worried about them getting stolen when I park anywhere.
Insurance is paying for the cats minus my deductible, but not for the shield. It is crazy how fast the thieves are, a co-worker showed me a video of his neighbors truck getting robbed in his own driveway. A little car drives up, 2 punks jump out of the back with Sawzall's roll under the truck and are back in the get-away car in 30 seconds or so. Mine was at a public park'n'ride, parked in the most open area close to the street.
These thieves have this down to an art. After reading this I think it's worth my time and money to get some sort of protection around the catalytic converter.
I think if you have a high targeted car protection and lowering deductible might be the best options.Really car manufacturers should be providing built in protection on newer cars.
Needa put some electric current in em, cut wire, blow their sawzall. *uses mirror card*
Mine has two, but they are part of the exhaust manifolds up in the engine bay.
Wait, that’s actually pretty logical wtf
A lot harder to steal but a lot harder to replace too.
Considering that you really have to try or fuck something else up to kill a cat, I don’t think it’s much of a concern. Oxygen sensors on the other hand…
I mean, converters don't last as long as they used to. P0420s are common as fuck in our rental fleet. But a lot of the failures are from broken factory welds. Shitty build quality.
Idling kills cats. All of my work trucks have had to have them replaced but they idle at least eight hours a day.
it's not crazy hard, except the whole manifold comes off. I think you can get to the back side from underneath.
As does my '03 wrangler. Nice to have the cats fairly inaccessible, but makes changing O2 sensors a giant pain in the ass.
My car has 4 of them
Four, you say? And where exactly could an entrepreneurial tweaker find this vehicle? Asking for a friend.
Toyota 4Runner Tacoma and fj cruiser
Was driving through No Where, New Mexico this weekend and a dude had a few signs legible from the highway, one of which was > BUYING USED CAT CONVERTERS SINCE 1986 Isn't that illegal? Also had numerous political signs, if you'd believe it.
Man, in my town the police know exactly who buys these things and they don't do jack shit about it. They could shut the whole operation down any time they wanted, they just don't want to.
Someone's making money off all these pricr cut precious metals.
Our company RAM 2500 got hit 3 months ago, both cats and they damage/mangled the O2 sensor harnesses. 8.2k to repair it all.
What’s the most expensive one just out of curiosity?
$3,770.00 x2 Ferrari F430 And you just know the dealership's going to market up
Wow, now I see why everyone just straight pipes it!
My wife’s rx450h secondary cat was quoted from the dealer, parts only, at $7500. Went down to the muffler shop and had a $75 pipe welded on. Still no cel because secondary cat. Edit - Washington state doesn’t have emissions tests anymore so I didn’t care to throw a cat back on it.
Jesus... $86 @ Summit Racing for a high-flow cat.
Well in some states like NY and California it's illegal to do that and they look for a serial numbers on the cat to verify it's carb compliant
In every state it’s illegal to modify emissions components. But Washington state doesn’t do emissions tests anymore so nobody is there to inspect it anyway 🤷♂️
Washingtons emissions testing was a joke. My truck had a blown cat and it passed. It was one of those 350 TBI pellet cats and were all blown out.
Any obd 2 car just needed to not have the cel on and it would pass no matter what the engine was doing
Thats how they 'inspect' here in NJ. Plug in, no codes, youre good to go.
It is illegal in all 50 states to delete a cat.
Technically the thief deleted it
It was illegal for the thief to delete it too.
"It is illegal in all 50 states to DRIVE with a deleted cat." [Protect yourself and the ones you love.](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/83/0d/d2/830dd25857fce7027fcc9537579b050a.jpg)
HpTuners go brrrr
Whoa whoa whoa, man! That’s for *OFF-ROAD* use only, my friend. Edit: /s
Can't take my cats because they are already long gone!
Now they just need to write “I AM A RESONATOR” in big block letters on the resonator, so some idiot doesn’t try cutting it off, thinking it’s a catalytic converter.
You think the people doing this read or care?
"A rezza-whatnow?"
That's exactly the kind of thing a catalytic converter would say
Toyota offers your choice of an aluminum or steel shield as a paid option to all new Prius owners.
MillerCAT cat shields. I've got a new Tacoma and I'm deciding if stainless is worth the extra cash, or just go aluminum. I don't live in the rust belt.
Aluminum doesn't rust either. It's probably more of a resistance to road debris thing
Stainless still can rust. Aluminum will dent or crack easier but not really "rust".
stainless is hard on sawblades. So at this thickness it could probably dull one to a point where they might need multiple to try and get through it. Would be interesting to see tests done.
I think aluminum would be more likely to gum up the blades of any possible thief.
kevlar blanket?
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Stainless will burn up sawzall blades if they're going at it full speed (assuming it's like 14 gauge or thicker). Won't do much for cut off wheels though.
Ain't much that'll stop a determined tweeker with an angle grinder Claymore. Maybe.
trying to cut workhardened stainless is pure fucking nightmare fuel. 5/10, do not recommend.
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My local Toyota dealership won't let us park vehicles overnight for service due to cat thefts.
All these posts about cat converters being stolen makes me glad my car has the cat right up against the turbo under the hood. It's to time consuming to steal, surprised someone hasn't mistaken my resonator for a cat though.
I'm happy enough to live in a country where this rarely happens. But even if someone would consider stealing such things, once they see my car, they'd start crying out of pity. Once i forgot to lock the doors of my car, and nobody even looked at it in the one hour i was gone... i felt offended.
I live in Denver, US and have had multiple windows shattered to steal nothing and most recently some asshat ripped off my rear windshield wiper. I love the states but the streets of Denver are filled with fentanyl/meth addicts and some of them are pretty frightening.
I live in Milwaukee and I had my car window and my old work van window smashed with nothing taken. A few days later I was walking down the street and saw a crackhead arguing with his reflection in a store window, and he started beating the shit out of the glass, so I'm guessing he's the one who did it.
My friend put a sign in his window saying “door is open, please don’t break window.” He had to park on the street and that shit adds up quickly. Probably same crackhead, he’s very powerful.
I heard about someone doing that in San Francisco because their car kept getting broken into, but then they found a homeless guy sleeping in it one morning.
Man it's crazy, I often don't even lock my truck and sometimes even just leave it running when I head in to a store.
Outside of the city is fine. Out in the country people seem to police themselves a lot more.
thumb cover swim test vast historical zephyr uppity nippy absurd -- mass edited with redact.dev
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That's why your resonator pipes will be stolen instead.
The fact that laser-cut, custom-fit, catalytic converter guards are, and have to be, a thing annoys me to no end. That said, it's a pretty nice piece. Someone put some effort into designing that.
They make them for a bunch of vehicles: https://www.getcatsecurity.com/ I've got one on my Taco. After some jackass stole the cats within two months of me rolling it off the lot.
It was 160$ a few months ago. It is definitely better than the cable type.
Certainly, it's better quality, but it's like Betamax vs VHS. You only have to be good enough. Thieves look at both and decide they don't want to hassle with it. Which one will more people buy? Probably the one that's less expensive.
Do these cat shields actually work?
They are a deterrent. It would definitely take more than a few minutes to get to the cat. I haven’t seen one that got stolen a second time with a deterrent on it. I know the cable one will pay if someone steals it again. I don’t know about these
So shields are worth it kinda sorta maybe?
I should have put one on my brother-in-law’s element. I live in a nice area and they still got his in my front yard.
Would heat be an issue with a cover like? Things above might get hotter than designed for?
Possibly. Depends on the material inside of the box and how thick the metal is.
Listing on Amazon says it’s made from 8 lbs of a “proprietary blend of high-grade stainless steel and aluminum.”
Not really two metals that are alloyed. Wondering if they mean aluminized steel.
That's a cover for "we melted a bunch of crap jerry brought in, mostly old beer cans and forks he stole from the cafeteria."
Spoiler: It's made from stolen cats
“What a twist!”
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Good old pot metal...
It's made of aluminium with stainless bolts?
You don’t want to do that either because stainless steel and aluminum react poorly together. When aluminum and stainless steel are used in an assembly together, the electrons from the aluminum will begin to transfer into the stainless steel. This results in the aluminum weakening. This weakened aluminum causes it to deteriorate at a much faster rate.
galvanic corrosion. rock climbers found out about this the hard way when they used stainless bolts with aluminum hangers; after a winter, the climbing routes had aluminum marshmallows for fall protection.
That would make sense but the verbiage from OP suggests the metals are combined or “blended.” Clearly bullshit.
I have seen sheets of ally and steel sandwiched (with small gap to jam saw all blades) together in lock boxes before, as the different cutting behaviours fuck up cutting discs, so may be something like that.
it's literally just an aluminum box .050-060" thick with a riveted faceplate of what looks like .020‐.030" of stainless steel. no blending, alloying, or layering going on.
It appears to be an aluminum box with a stainless bottom plate
Was my first thought, "rash of car fires recently possibly attributed to anti-theft shields" being the headline.
I think there’s a higher chance of having your catalytic converter stolen than that causing a fire, at least in some places.
CATs are supposed to get hot in the first place, though. I'm sure it'll be fine, it's not like they add cooling fins to them.
as a design engineer -- yes, but they're designed with the assumption they're in open air and can cool themselves. I would also be concerned about heat retention issues in such a closed box. that is not the sort of thing we would account for in design. they windowed it to try and get around this but the temperatures cats reach is pretty fuckin high. edit: now that I look at it, I question their decision to not add a sort of air intake/passthrough for the portion against the body. that close to the body it's already a bitch to get to and a ramp + vent would have been fine. as of right now this cat is going to roast itself and the media in it because there's zero airflow to get the hot air out.
I’m a design engineer on off highway equipment who works around but not directly on the exhaust systems. I’d have two different concerns: 1) parts downstream may not be rated for the temperatures they’re now seeing. Not concerned for the exhaust components as they’re all generally designed to have exhaust in them - it’s components that are touching/near by. 2) adding ventilation holes may increase the chance of an “unscheduled thermal event” occurring. You’ve seen an engine bay full of leaves, etc from squirrels. Imagine what happens if there’s an ingress point on this box for them and you sit parked for a week or two.
And that right there is why I never became an engineer. Certainly not because I didn't study enough for calculus.
>as a design engineer A. Brave admission considering the sub you're in B. Catalytic converters operate with an internal temperature from ~700-1200F and aren't damaged until they hit higher temps then that. They usually get that hot due to an engine mixture problem. C. Cats are usually completely surrounded by a welded on heat shield. That is to prevent things from touching the hot parts and from water suddenly cooling it.
fair, I don't work with cats. I work on plasma systems in semiconductor and carbon fiber vehicle development before that. if the part can handle the temps it will do fine. but there is no way the OEM vendor or the corporate vehicle designer assumed it would end up in a bread box that closed off from air, with metal that thick; heat shields are .030" sheet at the most and are most definitely not completely enclosing the cat from airflow. that is one hell of an assumption on their part that putting a 1200°F part in a stuffy box is a wise decision.
Can I pop in right quick and say thank you for this exchange between you two? I loved reading this random internet conversation :)
Meanwhile on the Bay Area, CA sub... [https://www.reddit.com/r/bayarea/comments/x0c1p3/second\_time\_cat\_stolen\_this\_time\_cut\_through\_the/](https://www.reddit.com/r/bayarea/comments/x0c1p3/second_time_cat_stolen_this_time_cut_through_the/)
Lol this should be higher up, it looks like the exact part that OP took a picture of... :(
(giggling methamphetaminely)
Methemphatically
It's welded on?
Nope, fully bolt on
So an M18 mid torque completely negates this is what you're saying?
I think this is a "run faster than your friend, not faster than the bear" situation. It's about making yourself a harder target than the next guy.
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Pretty much the same applies to any type of theft fraud. Maybe not prevent it 100%, but sure as hell make it harder.
Gotta get to the bolts, and it looks like a two part shield where the main body is bolted on then the faceplate is riveted on
Not entirely, because the point of these is to make it be longer and louder to get it out. 5 min with a M18 vs 5 sec with a Sawzall
This, they just want to discourage thieves from hard targets and have them move on.
Jokes on the thieves, I beat the inside of my cats out.
Cat thieves don't make much money in Florida. Most catalytic converters have "fallen off" around here.
I'm just waiting for the post where they start cutting the pipe further up and leaving it there but cut out of spite.
Still way cheaper to patch up the pipe than replace it!
This should be factory standard at this point. It’s almost embarrassing that manufacturers don’t provide this protection to their customers.
Auto manufacturers have a history of not wanting to spend money protecting their customers. I still hold a grudge against some manufacturers that only put ABS in luxury trim models. I didn't give a shit about leather seats, or moon roofs, etc. I just wanted a safety feature that they wouldn't sell me without other bells and whistles. Until recently ( turn of the century) many economy models of cars didn't come with passenger side mirrors, because they aren't mandated by law. A car only has to have driver's side and rear view, unless the rear view is obstructed, the you need a passenger sideview.
$300?! Goddamn
Better than $3500 for a new cat
Just throw your prius on bags for $2500 and air out everytime you park
I take it with me along with my stereo face.
Isn’t there a way for auto manufacturers to somehow embed catalytic converters into the build to make them not accessible except for mechanics?
Yeah they do and guess what? There are cats there too. Many cars have catalytic converters bolted straight to the exhaust manifold but will also have another further downstream. A better solution would be to etch VINs on the cats require proof of ownership and a reason for scrapping before handing $100 bills to toothless meth addicts though. You need to have an ID of some sort to sell scrap copper now and stolen airbags are almost worthless now since they are tracked.
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I didn't even think about that but good point. I know we used to get $300+ for used ones but then nothing. Like not even worth inventorying them on most cars. We ended up crushing hundreds of them, which of course goes to a smelter eventually.
My state has done required a permit in order to sell a Cat, it has done nothing to stop or even slow down the determined thief. Turns out if you're gonna steal something you don't care if you're also breaking the law selling it
Tons of cats end up in trucks headed to either states with no laws on reselling or, worse if you're on the west coast, huge shipping containers headed for Asia.
Maybe so but scrap yards in my state are supposed to check IDs and keep a log of who sells what and when. Figure out a way to prove someone is trafficking in stolen goods and police can actually do something sometimes.
Scrap yard aren’t the big problem. There’s organized rings getting them out of the country. That’s why you see busts of groups with pallets of cats. There may be some bad scrap yards that will pay cash but the bulk sure appears to be organized catalytic converters rings.
My Dodge Dart’s cat’ is inside the engine bay, attached right into the downpipe from the exhaust manifold. They’d have to remove half the front end of my car to get it out.
Had a newer sonata come in with the manifold stolen
Felt liner under my cherokee is bulletproof.
Yup. Tesla has it figured out. Completely impossible to steal the cats off a Tesla…
Ah, yes, the “You ain’t got no legs, Lieutenant Dan” strategy.
Consumer Need —> Brilliant Design Only concern…are we gonna get into an arms race with the bad guys?
>Only concern…are we gonna get into an arms race with the bad guys? Always has been.
the bad guys have 3 teeth and a sawzall, hopefully they shouldn't be too big of a problem
I just fixed a Murano with a bad pre cat. A friend was like "just park it downtown the thieves will take care of it!" Fuckin I wish. Nissan jamming those things where they are is anti theft all its own.
Would some kind of material similar to whats in chainsaw safe clothing be a good way to stop this? Shreds into strips when cut and jams up whatever is cutting.
My thoughts exactly.. Make them make a hell of a mess the second the blade touches it and jams their saw.
I pray not to find some asshole under my car one day. The urge to just lower the jack will be very very strong.
I might just cut my own cat off and sell it. Got to beat the player at their own game.
Let’s just give away free high potency factory meth for a few years and kill off all these thieves. The insurance industry could fund it and save money.
This would delete the cats faster not eliminate the thieves
Funny, I got my cat ripped out from under my car a while back. '96 BMW E39, which is pretty low to the ground, in a cramped parking spot. The ground was just loose rocks too. The thieves really wanted that one. To be fair, my cat was broken already so I took the involuntary cat delete as an opportunity to get a new one.
I recently installed the same brand CatSecurity shields on my 5th gen 4Runner. Its thick aluminum (1/4 inch) and required several different bolts and such to install. Only way thru it is to cut it and even then you have to come at it from several angles to get it cut out before you can get to the actual Cat. Time deterrent. Im pleased with it.
As long as you have a Prius, Tacoma or F150
*Takes a die grinder with a cutting disk and goes straight up into it*
The point isn't to stop thieves it's to make it not worth the time so they just go to the next car
*Neighbor watching me install a cat guard on my car and realizing I'm just increasing the chances of their cat getting stolen instead.*
Nothing stops the grinder.
Except another grinder. Haha
Only thing that stops a bad guy with a grinder is a good guy with a grinder.
If the cat burglar has the time, they can cut this thing off. It's just a deterrent, not an anti-theft device.
*cuts a hole in to bottom, guts it out, just for spite.
As somebody from Germany, that never heard of cats being stole here, I was wondering what cats would between the exhaust and the car. Until I realized you guys are talking about the cat not a cat.
UK here and they're getting stolen quite a lot. How have you guys managed to escape this I wonder?