I'm waiting to recieve my cattman headers which hopefully won't take too long to get. I remember reading on the maxmods site a while back before it was edited that headers will lean out the engine. Is this true? When I put the sniffer on my car when running it on the dyno it said my car was at 16:1 a/f ratio. I know tailpipe sniffers sometimes have a tendancy to read lean but I don't want to put these headers on and have my car running dangerously lean. I pulled the front 3 plugs and they were a bit white with a little brownish color but not a solid white color that would indicate it's running really rich. I would get a tune for it but I have to wait for some more cash and I also wanted to wait until I install my 00vi.

 

16:1 Holy Fawk.. Get An Afc Now!!!! Wb02 is heavily recommended as well, especially with that ratio.

 

tail pipe sniffers do have a tendacy to have a leaner reading that your actually A/F ratio. Especially if you have a functional cat in place then the 16.1 is probably after some of the exhaust gases were cleaned up by the cat.

 

I agree but, think about the stock A/F vs. 16:1. That's a bit too high IMO.

 

I know 16:1 is high but my teacher told me what I stated above about the sniffer reading lean. He took a look at the plugs and said it's a little lean but not lean enough to do any type of damage. I'm just trying to figure out if the headers will lean it out even more making it dangerously lean.

 

I have a feeling the headers not make you run leaner. see if you can find dyno's of those who got headers added and nothing else, see what their A/F ration looks like,
if he can get an A/F reading before the cat, that would be a good reading to go with. If before the car he's reading 16.7 then there is a problem. Ecu with no cel should keep the car pretty stoich at 14.7. At the tail pipe the reading will be pretty lean after the cat get to take its toll.

 

What part of the plug was white ? The ground electrode or firing tip ?
I installed NGK copper plugs 2 months ago and the ground electrods turned a bit whitish/grey color few weeks after replacement (I pulled few plugs to check them). I think they turned white/grey because I used too much anti seize on the threads and it leaked on the ground electrodes. The firing tip looks brand new , no color change.
Also my car has terrible gas mileage (13 mpg / 200 miles per tank - short trips in the city) and I replaced o2 sensors, knock sensor and many other things, with almost no improvement in mpg. I have no cel and no ghost codes.
How can I find out if the car is running rich ?

 

It was the ground electrode. One way to tell if it's running rich is the plugs would be a black color and not a white color. White is lean.

 

Sorry if I go off topic but if a fuel injector is leaking can you see that by looking on the plugs ?
Thanks

 

Yes. The plugs for the most part can tell you how the engine is running. This may help.

http://forums.nycmaximas.org/showthread.php?t=7237

Can anyone answer my question about the headers?

 

My car was @ 15ish:1 with my headers. I dont believe the tailsniffer.

 

dont believe the tail sniffers period! unless you're catless!.. to get an accurate reading get a wideband o2 before the cat, and go from there.

 

word...the whole point of cat is to reduce hydro carbons....so like said if ur catless they wont be oo far off but cats will throw A/F way off cause thats their job....get a wideband before cat...and headers will not make u run lean to the point where its 16:1....1 cars run rich from the factory so even if it did u would not be over 14.7.....u might have other issues....but tailpipe sniffe with cat= very inaccurate

 

Thanks for the info guys. I just wanted to be on the safe side. I will get it tuned eventually when I have the funds I just wanted to make sure it would be safe to put these on before I got it tuned.

 

what are ur mods.....and what are u tuning with

 

Right now all I have is a CAI, y-pipe, and cat-back. I'm waiting for the headers. I also have all main stuff i'll need to do the 00vi swap but i'm waiting until I go back home to NY to install it. I was going to pick up either the emanage or a vafc.