Cat stolen

Welp,

My 04 Techno Jeep was going to outlast all the haters. It was 15k miles away from hitting its prime at 200,000 and knew in my heart it would make it there with only a few repairs here and there every year.

Not anymore. Came out to find my catalytic converter was swiped sometime this weekend.

The cost of a new one + labor far outweighs any other maintenance costs I could've projected for the next two years and it doesn't feel worth it as only a commuter vehicle.

It's a shame that that's how it had to go but it is what it is I guess. Will probably hold onto it for a couple more weeks and try selling it locally to someone who wants to tinker with it.

Pour one out y'all.

Well that *****. Sorry that happened. Compared to a new car payment though (not compared to the “value” of the Jeep) is it reasonable to repair it?

lfhoward said:

Well that *****. Sorry that happened. Compared to a new car payment though (not compared to the “value” of the Jeep) is it reasonable to repair it?

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It's definitely cheaper than a new (used) car payment however my partner and I just bought a new new car and are splitting payments.

It's mostly a commuter vehicle at this point and rarely takes trips 20 miles. We've been considering going down to one car for months now but knew there wasn't much of a reason to do so as long as the Jeep still run.

Quite literally, this is the catalyst for us to seriously consider the one car life now.

Might be worth checking salvage yards or keeping an eye out for someone parting one out. My friend had his cats stolen of his ford recently and since emission checks and inspections are not required where we are he was able to get away with straight piping it.

There needs to be wayyyyy harsher penalties for theft.

I wrote some other stuff following that, but since this site has censorship for the word su.cks I took it all away, but you can use your imagination of horror films to know what I want to see done with those people.

Like duderz said, it's a shame you probably can't get away with just running a straight pipe like it allows here, and an additional muffler or resonator if the sound was too loud.

Anyone who steals cat converters deserves a beating.
I'm very sorry this happened to you.
I would take the time to phone around & see if you can find them from a bone yard. Best-o-luck.

Before you do anything drastic .... if you have the time and the energy, it maybe worth visiting your area scrap merchants. Cats main value is when they have been weighed in, and if it is a local ****** funding a habit that's where it might be. Here in the UK we had legislation passed a couple of years ago really tightening up that industry, and they now can no longer accept metals off random punters and have no records. It's not stopped criminal activity completely, but it has put up some decent safeguards.

Erskine said:

Before you do anything drastic .... if you have the time and the energy, it maybe worth visiting your area scrap merchants. Cats main value is when they have been weighed in, and if it is a local ****** funding a habit that's where it might be. Here in the UK we had legislation passed a couple of years ago really tightening up that industry, and they now can no longer accept metals off random punters and have no records. It's not stopped criminal activity completely, but it has put up some decent safeguards.

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I live in the US, and here in Maryland, the trend is to cut the cats and travel across state lines to get rid of the stolen cats. I don‘t know here, how I could prove that one is my cat.

Had it happen years back to a toyota tacoma and my local exhaust guy was able to fabricate a universal cay and some welding to make the truck street legal. A few hundred dollars, I think, is reasonable, compared with the cost of an oem cat. Good luck OP

JRB said:

There needs to be wayyyyy harsher penalties for theft.

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Repetitive junk kickings from the victim then jail.

Miracle update - my local muffler shop had me in and out within 90 minutes, trimmed off a portion of the pipe to weld on a universal cat. It was just shy of my $500 limit. I believe I would've had to pay $1,200 anywhere else for the entire assembly to be removed and replaced. Huge shoutout to Don's Muffler Clinic in St. Louis, Missouri.

The Jeep lives to fight another day.

C4pearson said:

Miracle update - my local muffler shop had me in and out within 90 minutes, trimmed off a portion of the pipe to weld on a universal cat. It was just shy of my $500 limit. I believe I would've had to pay $1,200 anywhere else for the entire assembly to be removed and replaced. Huge shoutout to Don's Muffler Clinic in St. Louis, Missouri.

The Jeep lives to fight another day.

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Most Excellent.

Great to hear that you were able to Keep the Jeep Roll'N! Thumbs up to the shop that fixed it!

C4pearson said:

Miracle update - my local muffler shop had me in and out within 90 minutes, trimmed off a portion of the pipe to weld on a universal cat. It was just shy of my $500 limit. I believe I would've had to pay $1,200 anywhere else for the entire assembly to be removed and replaced. Huge shoutout to Don's Muffler Clinic in St. Louis, Missouri.

The Jeep lives to fight another day.

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Awesome.