apparently both my cats on my '97 were shot, instead of replacing them the mech cleaned them out and drilled a hole in them. It drives like a bat out of hell now, before acceleration was spotty and weak. However it also sounds like a bat out of hell, and smells like hell(fuel). Is it normal to have a louder engine noise and a bit of a gassy smell from the exhaust pipe? will what he did save me gas (it obviously gave me more power)
thanks

 

I suspect your car was overly rich to begin with, causing the cats to go bad. Now without the cats there to burn the excess fuel, it smells rich.

 

and the main cat will probably suffer soon as well if it's still rich