I have a 2001 Dodge Neon SE that's been idling rough and getting worse for about three weeks now. A friend ran a diagnostic for me and there were three codes. The same code for a power steering sensor twice and a code the catalytic converter. The code for the cat has been on sense I bought the car last year but I havent had any problems until recently. I thought maybe it was the fuel filter and took it to a shop today only to find out that the fuel filter is mounted inside the pump in the tank and would cost alot of money to fix. They asked me what the symptoms were and I explained:

The car idles rough, if I accelerate slowly it does fine but if I give it gas it sputters bad, if I maintain a speed its fine.

The lady I was talking to said that with the code it sounded like the cat was bad, especially sense it has over 200K on it. She asked another guy while I was there but he said he thought it sounded like the fuel pump might be failing, because if it was the cat the engine would be running hotter than normal and it isnt. The cat makes more sense to me but I'm not sure, I dont have money for either. I have a friend at a shop who will cut the cat out if i do this is it going to cause any problems? Everywhere i read says something different, some say it will run lean, some say it will be fine. I dont know what to do.

 

A good way to tell if your cat is clogged is to drive it like hell for 15 minutes or so and see if it's glowing. Best to do it at night. If it's glowing, it's clogged. If you feel your pump is failing, take the fuel pressure from the rail.

 

My drive home is about 25min's at 65mph, so I'll check it when I get to the house. Its driving me crazy, no matter what shop I take it to I never get a definite answer, it either this or this!

 

That will definitely be enough time to get it nice and toasty.

 

Poor mans cat backpressure test if you don't have a gauge.

Pull upstream ( O2 sensor before the cat ) 02 sensor, drive it around ( gonna be loud ) and if performance gains then likely it's clogged.

You can pull cat, I would just knock the internals out and leave it intact, probably gonna trigger a CEL ( check engine light ) as darth pointed out you can use a spark plug defouler, stick it in the 02 sensor socket and then stick 02 sensor into that, that should trick the downstream ( after cat 02 ) into thinking emissions are cleaner.

As far as power steering codes go, mine goes air bound everytime i redline my car and I never trigger codes so no clue.....