2004 Escape Catalytic Converters
 

Im new to this forum hoping it will bring me some luck. I have a 2004 escape V6 3.0l front wheel drive. The catalytic converters are clogged. I have already had the one in the back replace (because that was the easy one). They are telling me at Car-x $2300 for the two up front. I understand these are connected to the manifold an thats why they are so expensive an hard to replace. Does anyone happen to know a work around for the 2 CAT connected to the manifold? I am not looking to spend alot of money just trying to keep it running for about 6 more months till I can get a new one.

Thanks
Amy

There is no cheap or easy way to do away with the converters. It is also illegal. Check with other exhaust shops in your area to see what other prices are. We have Midas Muffler here and they are fairly reasonable.

Vastly differing estimates
 

Our Ford Escape (2004 6cyl) refused to start one day and had symptoms of a dead battery. I jumped it and got it the few remaining blocks home. The next day I took the battery out and replaced it. It was checked at Advanced Auto Parts and diagnosed as bad - but still under warranty. When I started the car all the needles pegged to the right for about a second and then went to normal. It was running real rough. I thought maybe it would smooth out in a few minutes. I've heard that there are computers in the car somewhere that loose their "memory" and that this is not an unusual occurrence. The idle did not smooth out so I shut it off. It was ruff enough that I knew it would not be drivable. It was very rough. I left it sit in the driveway while I figured out what to do. I started the car the next couple of days for a few seconds and it did eventually smooth out. We were still afraid of driving it so it was in the driveway for the next 2 weeks and we would go out periodically and start it to see how it sounded. I continued to run smooth. When we took it out for a test drive, we got maybe a half mile away when we started loosing power. We quickly turned around and limped back to the house. About two tenths of a mile away it started really bogging down and could hear a loud hissing sound. The EGR valve had blown a big hole out the side.
We replaced that the next day but on the test drive I could tell there was the same loss of power so I took it right back and left it in the driveway.

We had it towed to our mechanic and confirmed our suspicion of the catalytic converts - he said there are three, but he doesn't know which one is bad. He looked up the prices for the three converters and parts and figured $1350 for the parts alone - that was for all three - "so maybe $2500 parts and labor" was his guess. His advice was to take it to a dealer and they could use their diagnostic equipment and tell which one was bad.
We did that, incurring a second tow bill. The dealer says that All FOUR catalytic converters need replaced AND "the exhaust looks a little rusty so we added that in, for a $6500 estimate but, there may be a few hundred more tacked on once they get the exhaust fixed. This is on a 2004 Ford Escape valued around $5500 to $6500.

I checked with Advanced Auto Parts and they came up with $800 approximately for the parts. And they see only three converters and what looks to be a resonator. They said that some people call it a catalytic converter. Is that true? Are there four or three?

Should I change one at a time to see which one is bad or change all three - or all four depending on how many are actually on it.


Lets say Advanced is wrong and the parts I need are $1500. That's looking like Ford is charging $5000 for labor! What kind of job is this? How can there be such a variation in parts and labor? And how is it legal to put a $6500 exhaust system on a car? I bet you could change the engine and transmission for that price.

I found out the converters had a warranty that expired just last year. Aint that lucky?