Engine in the shop...

in the shop...

i took in my corolla to the shop

here's what i'm getting:
new brake pads
they're installing my slotted rotors
laser alignment
new axles my cv boots are all shot
and my check engine light was turning on get that diagnosed

heres the BIG problem
the check engine light is saying that my cat putting out a bad signal.

they were gonna charge me $800+
for the labor and parts to fix my cat. he says thats step 1. if the engine check light is still on then maybe it's the o2 sensors and that would be step 2.

so i check online for some cats. and magnaflow sells one for the 98-02 corollas for $64... what's the deal????

the guy at the shop says that OEM cats are 500-600 aprox for parts only. he also said that late model cars 2000 and up have expensive cats. he's been doing some euro cars with the same check engine light code and charging $1500-$2000 for cat jobs. WTF?? is this the going price?

so if my cat is bad, i'd rather get those $64 cats. and if the O2 sensor is bad, i'm sure those wouldn't cost tooo much.

similar stories or experience welcomed, please!!!!

sounds like you should hit up another shop to get a 2nd opinion.

I know that OEM cats are very expensive, and that most after market cats are one time pass cats, meaning that once you put it on it will pass smog once and then its done

but o be honest with you i would look that the O2 sensor, the post cat sensor which i whats throwing the defective cat code only wroks in closed loop after the car is hot untill then the reading is ignored by the ECU, so what good shop will do is warm up the car and backprobe the sonsor with lab scope to see the wave form, then you'll know weather how the sonsoer is operating.

But as prilimanry measure you can take you car to the Pierce auto shop and talk to Tom Rosdahl, and ask tell him your problem and ask him if you can come by whenthe tune up or smog class is doing lab and they will put your on a smog dynop and tellyou ifthe cat is functioning or not. best of all its free

i've taken it to pierce before. it was free but took forever! best thing is to know someone who is in the mechanics class and things will go more smoothly.

What year was your corolla?

The big reason for the price difference is the factory is a bolt up deal and it's one peice from the manifold to the muffler. The aftermarket will be cutting in the middle of that single peice to only replace the cat.

If your rolla is OBDII than you can hook up a scan tool and watch the wave patterns from the o2 sensors. If the rear o2 is reading the same as the front o2, obviously the cat is not doing it's job...

i drive a 2001 corolla CE. everything is good now. i got a CA legal cat from magnaflow installed. I know about the entire setup with toyota. i wasn't going back to stock pipe. besides, i got a great deal and my CEL doenst turn on anymore. i guess the new cat IS doing it's job.

I think that code is a 2 trip code, it may take a few days to check that monitor.

But that is awesome you most likely got it taken care of!