Some petrolheads see them as a nuisance, but cats are a vital component for your vehicle’s emissions control
A war on emissions has been raging for the best part of 40 years,
with governments coming down hard on the automotive industry.
In the 1970s, the US government enforced a law that state every car manufacture from
that year onward had to be fitted with a device calle aconverter unlimited .
This device soon spread throughout the world of cars and has now
become a staple of emissions control and is integrate into virtually every modern exhaust system.
The cat sits around a third of the way down the exhaust system and resembles a small metal chamber that receives exhaust gasses
and changes the chemical nature of them to reduce the volume of nasty emissions fresh from the exhaust manifold.
Within the cat
Within the cat housing is a ceramic-based honeycomb structure that is line with extremely precious metals, with each metal having a specific job in emission-reduction.
There are three main emissions produce by car engines: nitrogen gas (N2), carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapour (H2O).
The catalytic converter however is mostly use to tackle the smaller,
more-harmful products that are produce due to the naturally-imperfect combustion process of the IC engine.
These are carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides. Most cats these days are therefore calle three-way catalytic converters due to the three main types of emission that they manage to tackle.