1) older Toyota 4-runners are prime targets due to amount of precious metals in the converter (and BMW's) and because of the ground clearance making it an easy "under & out" job - my insurance adjuster says they can do it in 30 secs. when they cut the pipes like they did on ours.
2) Always have comprehensive insurance & consider rental insurance. Insist on getting a check for the full cost of replacing with Toyota parts - then you can decide after check in hand if you're going to use after-market parts instead - which are much less expensive, and of lessor quality.
3) Rental insurance coverage costs $20/6mo for $900 wortho of rental car should this happen again, or a crash disables vehicle. We've been without the car for 2 1/2 wks due to several insurance adjustors, back-ordered part, and general confusion since we have a California emmissions vehicle registered in Virginia.
4) If you have a sticker under your hood indicating it is a California emissions vehicle -and your car is registered outside California - your local mechanic and his welder may be totally confused about what this means when it comes to catalytic converter replacement. DO YOUR OWN HOMEWORK !!!!!
5) Air Resources Board - Homepage is the place to go to get answers if your vehicle is or may in the future be registered in California. 1-800-242-4450. They also have a database where you can identify what parts are approved for your vehicle.
6) EO - Executive Order, is the mechanism by which you know you have an approved california emissions part.
7) Several mechanics will tell you that you should replace it with an OEM (original equipment manufacturer - i.e. Toyota) part - which runs in the $1000 -$2000 range compared to $200-400 range for after market. If you don't use Toyota part, chance you'll be dealing with engline light issues. Engine light issues in this case may very well be due to the inability for a lessor grade part to handle engine issues you had but were getting away with due to your "better" Toyota converter. After tons of research (seriously - about 16 hrs worth) we're going to take that chance - stay tuned.
8) The other 49 states operate under the federal standard - permitting more pollutants. We used the California database in addition to other recommendations to identify which 2-3 manufactures we considered.
9) CALL THE MANUFACTURE's DIRECTLY AND TALK TO THE TECHNICIANS-In our case I called Walker (almost called Bosal but it wasn't on the approved California list so didn't). The Walker tech (Joe I think) was fantastic - and went into great detail clearing up a lot of general questions I had. THE MAIN ADVANTAGE is ASSURING YOU GET THE CORRECT PART NUMBER FOR YOUR VEHICLE.
10) If you're car is registered in one of the 49 states (not Calif) -you can choose whether to install a California one or a federal one. Expect to wait at least a week for a California part. In our case, there was very little difference in price between the two - and the federal part is in stock locally so we're going with that.
11) Meinicke would only install the Toyota part - to avoid dealing with engine light troubleshooting which can lead them to have to replace a new aftermarket part with the Toyota one.
12) Tuffy however took the opposite approach and indicated they usualy put aftermarket parts on - usually the California approved in such cases and that if the engine light comes on they might have to replace with a different company part (upgrading).
13) RE: direct fit vs universal. Direct fit usually has the pipes also so if your pipes are in decent shape - you may only need the converter itself (universal).
14) Consider an inexpensive alarm system and going to a machine shop and having them weld on a protective cover to make it more difficult for the next attempt.
I hope this helps - I'm no mechanic, but learned a ton of info over 16 hrs of research.
2) Always have comprehensive insurance & consider rental insurance. Insist on getting a check for the full cost of replacing with Toyota parts - then you can decide after check in hand if you're going to use after-market parts instead - which are much less expensive, and of lessor quality.
3) Rental insurance coverage costs $20/6mo for $900 wortho of rental car should this happen again, or a crash disables vehicle. We've been without the car for 2 1/2 wks due to several insurance adjustors, back-ordered part, and general confusion since we have a California emmissions vehicle registered in Virginia.
4) If you have a sticker under your hood indicating it is a California emissions vehicle -and your car is registered outside California - your local mechanic and his welder may be totally confused about what this means when it comes to catalytic converter replacement. DO YOUR OWN HOMEWORK !!!!!
5) Air Resources Board - Homepage is the place to go to get answers if your vehicle is or may in the future be registered in California. 1-800-242-4450. They also have a database where you can identify what parts are approved for your vehicle.
6) EO - Executive Order, is the mechanism by which you know you have an approved california emissions part.
7) Several mechanics will tell you that you should replace it with an OEM (original equipment manufacturer - i.e. Toyota) part - which runs in the $1000 -$2000 range compared to $200-400 range for after market. If you don't use Toyota part, chance you'll be dealing with engline light issues. Engine light issues in this case may very well be due to the inability for a lessor grade part to handle engine issues you had but were getting away with due to your "better" Toyota converter. After tons of research (seriously - about 16 hrs worth) we're going to take that chance - stay tuned.
8) The other 49 states operate under the federal standard - permitting more pollutants. We used the California database in addition to other recommendations to identify which 2-3 manufactures we considered.
9) CALL THE MANUFACTURE's DIRECTLY AND TALK TO THE TECHNICIANS-In our case I called Walker (almost called Bosal but it wasn't on the approved California list so didn't). The Walker tech (Joe I think) was fantastic - and went into great detail clearing up a lot of general questions I had. THE MAIN ADVANTAGE is ASSURING YOU GET THE CORRECT PART NUMBER FOR YOUR VEHICLE.
10) If you're car is registered in one of the 49 states (not Calif) -you can choose whether to install a California one or a federal one. Expect to wait at least a week for a California part. In our case, there was very little difference in price between the two - and the federal part is in stock locally so we're going with that.
11) Meinicke would only install the Toyota part - to avoid dealing with engine light troubleshooting which can lead them to have to replace a new aftermarket part with the Toyota one.
12) Tuffy however took the opposite approach and indicated they usualy put aftermarket parts on - usually the California approved in such cases and that if the engine light comes on they might have to replace with a different company part (upgrading).
13) RE: direct fit vs universal. Direct fit usually has the pipes also so if your pipes are in decent shape - you may only need the converter itself (universal).
14) Consider an inexpensive alarm system and going to a machine shop and having them weld on a protective cover to make it more difficult for the next attempt.
I hope this helps - I'm no mechanic, but learned a ton of info over 16 hrs of research.
