Here is the deal. I got a new oxygen sensor at about 85k miles.(98 honda accord lx, 4cylinder automatic) I currently just passed 106k miles. I also just got 678 dollars worth of work done to my car(new timing belt, water pump, brakes, oil change, tire rotation/balance) - two days later my check engine light comes on so i go to autozone so he can check the code...it gives me the same code as it did at 85k miles- P0420

he is like, either its your catalytic converter or your oxygen sensor- i tell him i got a new one at about 85k miles and he basically told me it could NOT be that(my first question is, is that correct...i can totally rule that out?)

He said(autozone guy) that its either that someone didnt connect something correctly when they did that work which is causing it to come on, or its the catalytic converter. I'm assuming these people that worked on my car did it correctly. I have also noticed my fuel consumption seems to be not too well. Being a student in college, I dont have the most money, and i really dont want to fix a catalytic converter if its the oxygen sensor, or vice-versa.

In yalls expert opinions(compared to me at least :-P ), what do you think I should do?

Thanks so very much,

Josh

 

If you have a jack you can check to see if the oxygen sensor is working and connected properly. Also, what does the P0420 code read? It's less likely to be the catalytic converter since it's supposed to last a lot longer than 106k miles, so check the oxygen sensor first, then you would need to look into the catalytic converter. And don't just buy a new one immediately, see if you can find someone to take a look at it for you.

 

You could also have a large leak at the exhaust manifold or where your two piece manifold comes together. Though its not likely, but that happened to me when the gaskets in my header blew and my mpg went down and it gave me the same code.

But I agree, have someone look at it. And make sure everythings connected.

 

If you feel up to it you can do some basic inspections yourself. Make sure there isn't an exhaust leak (as was mentioned) then check the connections to your O2 sensors, make sure they are clean, free from debri, oil, water, rust etc. and making a good contact, if all of those things check out then you'll need to start doing some more testing.

 

so i took it to the place that did the work last week. The guy said it looks like i had a "bad cat" - he said i could just wait til my next inspection(april 08) because it wont affect the performance at all. I told him that the guy at autozone told me i'd get 1 or 2 miles per gallon less and he didnt really address that, all he said was that if anything, i'd have more power...he cleared the code and told me to call when it came back on

i looked up catalytic converters on autozone for my honda and it came up to about 163 i think.

anyways, i'm going to try and get one of my automotive friends to see if he can tinker with it...maybe i can get him a case of beer or something for the effort:-p

thanks to those that helped,

Josh