Lude Generation

Excellent, glad it was nothing major.

That's great news. Happy days.

Excellent news, pleased for you!

Thanks - final step is to take off exhaust and see what is rattling around - maybe centre section or cat has some damage due to misfire and oil contamination....hope to get this checked over tomorrow

jeez - that's another bullet dodged

dropped the exhaust and found the cat was blocked - the honeycomb had melted and some sections had broken loose but got fired out the backbox...the centre silencer is ok
i had to break up all the remains of the honeycomb and empty the cat out before refitting it

A pic of the CAT. The honeycomb had melted and formed large blobs that had to be restrictive.

Glad you checked it!
Is that an OEM cat or aftermarket?
Also just to check... Someone hasn't used exhaust putty on joints upstream of the cat, have they?

Obviously overheated from over fuelling when the dizzy went caput (car still fuelling but not combusting). I had this also on my last 2.2vti after a track day. It got so restrictive the car would hardly drive over 50mph.

How easy was it to remove the insides? I did similar once on a rover 820 turbo and it was physically very hard work (enough to put me off ever trying it again). That over fuelled because a boost pipe popped off. Didn't take much to block up. When I got out the drivers side, i could feel the intense heat on my leg, looked under to see a red glow. Probably wasn't far off the car setting on fire...

My current car also has rattling bits inside the cat - most likely from track day action lol.

Scott the cat monolith was easy to remove - i used a small pry bar to break it up and scrape it out - took about 5 mins.

An interesting story to read through, @vanzep, and glad it all turned out for the best. Great pictorial guide. Thanks for sharing.