crauled under my 2001 f-150 looking for source of rattle, and discovered tailpipe rusted and broken right at catalytic converter......have dual exhaust and right side is not broken.......70,000 miles on truck. does this sound like it is repairable, would I need to replace catalytic converter?
made error in my question....what I have is a cat back dual exhaust. exhaust pipe goes from catalytic converter to some rectangular metal "box" that splits exhaust to 2 tailpipes......one of the tailpipes is rusted and broken right at this "box"
A good muffler shop can often re-weld breaks like this. It will quiet the car for a little while, but you probably should start saving your money for a general repair.
When you start welding rust or burned out metal, you are just barely keeping the wolves at bay.
If the guy at the muffler shop tells you he can fix it, he most likely can. He can actually see it.
You can try near you, but you may have to go to a moderately poor n'hood. The higher income the n'hood is, the less likely they will be interested in doing anything but replacing it. I went through this myself with a cat about 10 years ago -- my break was maybe a couple inches from the cat, iirrc -- and the guy near me only wanted to replace it. A few miles closer to downtown, the shop had all the same tools the shops in the suburbs do, but it didnt' give free cookies and coffee or have a spacious "waiting room". It was as neat and clean as a normal shop, but wasn't the ridiculous sparkling clean you sometimes see.
The guy quoted me a price of 50 dollars or so, to the best of my recollection.. Once he got started I could see that he definitely knew how to weld. . He put one bead around the whole pipe and then went around it a second time putting on another bead, next to the first, I guess. I wonder if everyone would have done two layers.. I gave 10 dollars more than he had asked.
I had the car for 3 or 4 more years, with no further problem with the exhaust system.
It is a crime to throw away a good cat just because one seam is broken. I guess there's a good chance the platinum will be recycled, but a) not 100% chance, b) I wonder if they get all the platinum when they do recycle, and c) the steel may or may not get recycled.
I had the same experience as you. E28 BMW 535i (well used,) downshifted for a turn and suddenly I thought a machine gun had gone off nearby but it turned out that the outlet pipe had just pulled out of the body of the cat. Nobody in the "nice" areas wanted to touch it but a muffler shop closer to Detroit proper fixed me right up for cheap. Car wouldn't have been worth the price of a new cat.
nate
Yeah, same story.
Even if it woudl have been, no point in wasting money, etc.
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