Need help failed twice

S

Sleeper

Member
Joined
May 24, 2001
Need some help here. The car is not a GN but a 2002 Mazda Protege 5.
It has failed twice. The first time I just drove it in figuring it would pass. Boy was I wrong... Failed across the board.
ASM 2525 Curb idle
HC ppm 116 Limit 66 Fail 231 Limit 150 Fail
Co% .70 Limit .37 Fail .73 Limit .70 Fail
No ppm 1094 Limit 505 Fail NA NA
RPM 2742 704
Dilution 14.2 Valid 14.2 Valid

So, I check and clean the EGR, change the oil, fix some of the spark plug boot wires (Possible miss firing?) Pull off the stupid aftermarket cold air intake, and put on factory air box and filter. Try to use up most of the old gas in the tank, add a little Naptha gas. Take the car back in figuring it should pass with no problem now... Wrong!

ASM 2525 Curb idle
HC ppm 100 Limit 66 Fail 176 Limit 150 Fail
Co% ..57 Limit .37 .33 Limit .70 Pass
No ppm 1082 Limit 505 NA NA
RPM 2715 700
Dilution 14.7 Valid 14.6 Valid

I'm lost. What should I be looking to do now?
If the cat is bad would it cause the readings to be this bad? Or if the motor is bad ??? Did a compression test and got 155 across the board. Car doesn't smoke, or appear to burn oil.
Help :confused:

Paul
 
Isnt it OBD2?? Why is it being put on the sniffer? I see your from Canada, do you guys have OBD2?
 
We have a "Drive clean" program here in Ontario (Canada) where they make you get your car tested every 2 years.
Yes it is OBD II
 
For OBD2 you need to hook up the OBD connector for the emission. As long as the check engine light is off, and all the monitors are set for the evap system it should pass no problem. I dont see how a car that new would be running that bad?? Could be a bad O2 sensor. What does you long and short term fuel trim look like? Hows you fuel mileage?
 
Don't have a scanner yet. Going to try and borrow or buy a cheap one. Couldn't tell you anything about the fuel trims.
Gas mileage seems fine, but I really haven't had the car long enough to tell yet

I suspect the car has been abused a bit. Kid owned it before had put on a cold air intake. Don't know if anything else was done to it engine wise. Wondering if the cat has been gutted or wrecked.

Do you think a bad cat would cause such bad readings
 
Curb idle NOx ppm 1094 Limit 505 Fail
Going to check what the timing is, and see if the injectors are good.
 
NOx is produced by high combustion temps. I would check and see it the cat has been gutted also. Double check everything under the hood, make sure all the vac lines are good, and everything is hooked up, tightened up. I guess you could check the timing but its not externally adjustable, correct? Did the previous owner do and upgrades to the engine (timing gear swap). There could also be alot of carbon in the cylinders, does the car detonate at all? Try to take it to a shop and get the info out of the computer and see what the fuel trims are, you can diagnose alot by knowing wheather its pulling fuel or adding fuel to compensate for another problem. Did you change the fuel filter lately? If you go to the shop, write the numbers down on the info given.
 
Thanks, appreciate your input.
Previous owner(s) did mod the car, so I suspect some stuff needs to be checked. I'll have to go over everything to see. I pulled off the ricer cold air intake setup, and put the factory air box back on, am going to pull the aftermarket ignition setup (300 times more spark energy LOL) and go back to stock. Going to check the timing belt anyway, so I can see if the cam timing marks are aligned. Dont know if the ECM has been messed with, or if the timing is off, but will check. Ran some Seafoam through her to deal with any carbon deposits. Only has an intank fuel pump sock, and no external filter. Guess I'll have to pull that to see what shape the sock is in. O2 sensor needs to be checked as well. If I cant find anything obvious, I going to see If I can pick up a realtime scanner, if not... take it to a shop like you said, and get it put on the computer to see what the fuel trims are like.
 
My money is on the converter. Usually if it fails in two or more areas, especially NOX, it's the cat. My guess is that it has over 100k and/or uses oil. Burning oil will kill the NOx part of the converter first. Car was modded so it was run hard, maybe neglected oil changes which can cause excessive wear.
 
Managed to put a scanner on it today and pull some stored codes.
Got a PO421- Warm up catalyst efficiency below threshold bank 1
There are two cats on these cars. 1st one is a "pre cat" used for start up emissions, but doesn't really do much after the car is warmed up. There are two O2 sensors. One before the pre cat and one after the 2nd cat. The secondary (rear, downstream of the second cat, is what tells the ECU if the cat is working or not. The the primary is BEFORE the cats, it's what the ECU uses to set the fuel trims.

I know there was an massive exhaust leak before I bought the car and it was repaired.(FWIW J-pipe was replaced) so it might have caused the code, and now it is just stored. I'll need to erase the codes, reset the ECM and see if it
comes up again.

P0660 Intake Manifold Tuning Valve Control Circuit/Open (Bank 1)
An open or shorted condition detected in the manifold tuning valve solenoid control circuit. Refers directly to the VICS solenoid. I will have to check the wiring and connectors to see if it has been messed with.
 
What does freezeframe data tell you. Under what conditions did each of those codes set? If you cleared the codes, then you lost freezeframe data. So I hope you did not clear the codes.
 
No not yet. This is the only freeze frame data I could find.

Freeze frame
DTCFRZ1 PO421
Fuel Sys 1 CL
Fuel Sys 2 N/A
LOAD_Pct % 39.2
ETC (F) 187
SHRTFT1 % -3.1
LONGFT1 % -3.1
RPM (/MIN) 2758
VSS (MPH) 58
 
I would be leaning towards an o2 sensor. I see the computer is pulling fuel, so either the car is running rich or it thinks its running rich (faulty o2). As far as diagnosing this always go to the code with the highest priority (o2 sensor in this case) I would replace these first as they are probably cheaper than a new cat (which could still be good)
 
Yeah, I think I'm going to pick up a primary O2 sensor. It just hurts to dump $300 if it isn't the problem. They have universal sensors for around $140 but I have heard they have a history of not working that well with the P5's (much like the aftermarket Vs Delco stuff for the GN's)
 
FWIW Update.
Upon further inspection, I pulled off the Cat pipe and it was full of junk? Wondering where it came from, I looked up at the primary cat (It attaches directly to the Ex manifold) and saw it was empty? I pulled that off and saw it had a meltdown. All the material inside disintigrated and got forced through to the second cat. I was lucky to find out that the Primary cat is just a warm up emissions cat, and is kinda redundant after the car runs for a few min. The secondary cat is the one that does all the work. I managed to pick up a dual Cat secondary pipe off a Mazda MSP for $20 that bolts directly in, and bingo the car runs great now. (and probably cleaner than factory stock)
Irony of all this, is that when I went to the licenceing office, they had on the computer that the car had already passed emissions, so in theory I could have drove it as is legally. Not something I would do though.

Thanks for all the help,
Cheers,
Paul
 
E-85

Sleeper said:
Need some help here. The car is not a GN but a 2002 Mazda Protege 5.
It has failed twice. The first time I just drove it in figuring it would pass. Boy was I wrong... Failed across the board.
ASM 2525 Curb idle
HC ppm 116 Limit 66 Fail 231 Limit 150 Fail
Co% .70 Limit .37 Fail .73 Limit .70 Fail
No ppm 1094 Limit 505 Fail NA NA
RPM 2742 704
Dilution 14.2 Valid 14.2 Valid

So, I check and clean the EGR, change the oil, fix some of the spark plug boot wires (Possible miss firing?) Pull off the stupid aftermarket cold air intake, and put on factory air box and filter. Try to use up most of the old gas in the tank, add a little Naptha gas. Take the car back in figuring it should pass with no problem now... Wrong!

ASM 2525 Curb idle
HC ppm 100 Limit 66 Fail 176 Limit 150 Fail
Co% ..57 Limit .37 .33 Limit .70 Pass
No ppm 1082 Limit 505 NA NA
RPM 2715 700
Dilution 14.7 Valid 14.6 Valid

I'm lost. What should I be looking to do now?
If the cat is bad would it cause the readings to be this bad? Or if the motor is bad ??? Did a compression test and got 155 across the board. Car doesn't smoke, or appear to burn oil.
Help :confused:

Paul
Click to expand...


Do ya'll have E-85 gas? If so, put a couple of gallons in with about 4 gallons of 87 octane....






:smile:
 
Listen to GOFSBUICK. He is right And is really trying to steer you in the right direction.You need your old base to see what you are doing. Also I don't think the air intake is it.Check vacumn.But listen to hin HTH'ed..rob
 
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