Sulfuric Rotten Type Smell

[Aggieland81]

Ok, everyonce in awhile, ussually when its sorta warm out and i take my car above about 4500-5000 rpms, i get a sulfuric rotten type smell coming from the engine. Driving my dads 03 Aviator a few weeks before i floored it to like 6000 and it had the same sorta smell. Does this mean that maybe the gas we've been getting in the area could have been bad? Or was that just a coincidence? Anyone know what it is?

[e36_m3_Turbo]

Originally posted by Aggieland81@Jan 11 2004, 04:17 PM
Ok, everyonce in awhile, ussually when its sorta warm out and i take my car above about 4500-5000 rpms, i get a sulfuric rotten type smell coming from the engine. Driving my dads 03 Aviator a few weeks before i floored it to like 6000 and it had the same sorta smell. Does this mean that maybe the gas we've been getting in the area could have been bad? Or was that just a coincidence? Anyone know what it is?

probably shit in ur pipes or somethin..could be the gas..what kind do u use?

[Aggieland81]

93, my dads brand new 4000 mile aviator uses it to, i dont think he would already have shit in his pipes

[e36_m3_Turbo]

Originally posted by Aggieland81@Jan 11 2004, 04:22 PM
93, my dads brand new 4000 mile aviator uses it to, i dont think he would already have shit in his pipes

is it all the time?

[Aggieland81]

No only like 25% of the time go over 5000

[frank3]

Oftentimes, a rotten egg smell indicates that the catalytic converter has gone bad.

[Aggieland81]

not what i wanted to hear....

[EXtech]

It's not uncommon to smell that rotten sulfur smell after driving the snot out of almost any new car these days. Don't worry about it on the Aviator. How old is your car and how many miles does it have on it? If it's new, then I wouldn't worry about it either. As cars get older and increase in mileage (usually 90-100K sometimes less), you may have to replace the cat. converter. It's the same with O2 sensors.

[El Presidente]

indeed, my money is on the cat. Although the smell all the time is an indiction of it gone bad. Only occasionally is sign its getting there.

[Aggieland81]

93 with 80k miles.

[fernguy]

It may not be a bad Cat.The old sytle cats used to be a type of pebble meduim that cause the reaction for the cat to work.When the meduim went bad it would no longer cause the reaction so you would smell a rotten egg smell. But with the new style honeycomb cats they are much more efficient. Your car has a preset fuel curve for full-throttle that is part of the cars PCM programming. So the car injector on time is set to run slightly rich to reduce any possible detonation. You might check the air filter and inlet for restrictions. The cat should be able to handle slightly rich fuel mixture. But with a restriction you have to much gas and not enough air in the mix. A good test to check your cat is to purchase or borrow a Hand-held infared temp sensor . Drive the car for about 10 minutes at 30 miles a hour then point the infared sensor at the cat if you get a reading of 500degrees the the cat is fine if lower than cat may be on its way out.

[PhiLLaY]

im with el president my money is on the cat too

[TECH]

It's the cat. It doesn't mean its bad though. Running an engine hard will bring about that smell.