Catalytic Converter by Eastern

Catalytic converter by Eastern honestly is all that has been recommended to me by everybody. They say go to Eastern or Flowmaster, not Magnaflow. A number of people have had problems with Magnaflow - I hear that everywhere.

Exhaust products that are 2.5 inch like mine was are supposed to also include OD or ID. OD is for 2.5 inches plus so it'll fit over a 2.5 inch pipe. ID for if it'll fit into a 2.5 inch pipe. This Eastern product was represented as 2.5 inch. I bought adapters to match that "truth". The product was actually 2.5 inch OD or about 2.75 inches. This made installation much more difficult. I had to use twice as many adapters as it wasn't what I expected. This resulted in 50% more exhaust hangars while I chose out my welder and learn welding for the first time.

Pro's for this Eastern Catalytic Converter:
I have 30 more horse power at the peak horse power for my engine with this upgrade from my original 2 inch catalytic converter. To be clear, I went with something bigger and only with Eastern could find a catalytic converter that wasn't 2 inches.

Hmmm, I have a custom exhaust and you want to sell me my original catalytic converter? You see, the problem is that everyone wants to know what car you have. If you put in what car you have you won't get database results from 5 out of the 6 stores I tried for a bigger catalytic converter.

Most people get a higher flow catalytic converter if they want performance. This is achieved by going with less cells. A standard catalytic converter that'll pass emissions has about 400 cells. A high flow may only have 100 or 200 cells. This makes a lot of cars get a P0420 code from their ECU turning on their Check Engine Light or CEL. I bring up the abbreviation because many forums on these subjects confused me until I knew what they were referring to.

You see the O2 sensor in front of the catalytic converter has the job of seeing how much O2 is left
after combustion so that the ECU or PCM (Power Control Module) can adjust how much fuel is going in the engine or the fuel trim. The O2 sensor behind or down stream from the catalytic converter sees if the catalytic converter is really catalyzing as much as it should. To pass emissions your catalytic converter must be at least 95% efficiency.

I can't afford dyno testing, but I used the next best thing...I personally don't see how it could have bad results, the app on my phone has all the data required to run the calculations to get horse power. I used an OBD II Bluetooth scanner that plugs in my car and I bought the professional Torque app, though the free version wasn't bad, I just wanted to have the faster program...be able to set up to monitor for more things, and overall just have a faster, better experience.

I fed it information like how many kilograms my car was - don't use the GVRM sticker on your door panel. GVRM is the rating your car has for what it can carry, not what weight it really is. Also way yourself and convert it into kilograms if necessary and all your occupants. Using an actual auto scale would be more accurate, but while my car is very upgraded, the upgrades don't effect it's overall weight much at all. The Weapon R Intake is a little lighter for example, but I have some papers and junk under my seats so it comes about even in the wash.

My car is supposed to have 125 horsepower since I have the 2000 Chevy Prizm LSI engine. After running the torque app I believe that was flywheel and not at the wheel horse power. When I needed a new MAF or mass air flow sensor, I got 25 to 40 horse power when the engine was choking on too much oxygen (turns out MAF fail caused the choking symptoms, not the catalytic converter, but the catalytic converter was still bad).

After a new MAF, I could get 59.5 horse power if my neighbor and I were going up a steep ramp onto the freeway. Something interesting about how my ECU is set up is that it won't put out maximum horse power unless I'm going up hill. I was getting 45 horses power on slighter inclines and only in 1 out of 3 runs for a freeway ramp going down hill did I get close to the maximum horse power.

After the new catalytic converter by Eastern my horse power was...pause for dramatic effect...pause for a drum roll . . . 90.1 horse power!

It's my opinion that a good air intake like Weapon R works best if you have a good exhaust upgrade, especially if you upgrade your exhaust. I think many who don't get a good result on their intake, don't because they didn't get an exhaust upgrade first. Weapon R Intake Review Want more detail? I wrote 2 more Catalytic Converter articles discussing why I thought I got more Horse power.

Ignore the Torque, that's
acceleration down hill in neutral.

Just looking at my opinion for the results:
Edit Sept. 7th, 2014
So if my engine really was originally 125 horse power at the fly wheel  and we assumed a 15% power
loss from the engine and everything attached we should get 106.25 HP. My most recent test has me at 109 HP. Considering how my Chevrolet Prizm is a lot faster than a brand new Chevrolet Prizm, I don't believe the power loss is only 15%. It makes sense that an engine's *accessories would lose more power than 15% on small engines. All of these upgrades and working backwards from 109 at the wheels HP or WHP doesn't makes sense that I'm only up to 128 HP at the flywheel from stock.

Of course, getting nearly tuned
stock headers didn't hurt either!

*I think the manufacturer got 125 HP with the engine running nothing that takes away HP that actually keeps an engine running in the real world. There's no way the tremendous improvement I felt was just getting me back up to slightly above stock power. I refuse to get conclusive proof by taking my car back to stock, it's too expensive and may be a week of work. I drove a lot of these cars when I worked on a lot, they all felt about the same as my car before the improvements. In this case, my opinion has to be enough, but I'd love to see true stock wHP numbers but without a time machine none of these cars are new enough to find out.

by AutoBravado