2004 Toyota Camry with the 2.4 liter, 2AZ-FE engine
Hello I have two questions regarding my car.
1. It burns a quart of oil every 3500-4000 miles. Should I have a new engine installed, rebuild the current one, or live with it? Transmission is in excellent shape.
2. I have a code P0420 catalyst below efficiency threshold. I only get this code driving on the highway. Freeze time showed the code was tripped while going 70 MPH. I have owned the car for two years. No drivability issues. Could this be due to the engine burning oil? I checked for vacuum leaks and replaced PCV Valve. No vacuum leaks. But I noticed that the code would go away for three months or so and come back.
Car has 123k miles.
Thank you.
1. It burns a quart of oil every 3500-4000 miles. Should I have a new engine installed, rebuild the current one, or live with it? Transmission is in excellent shape.
I would live with it.
I only get this code driving on the highway
Here is a possible scenario:
Your car might not run good in higher speeds (check the live data) and the cat efficiency is marginal.
Could this be due to the engine burning oil?
Burning oil can reduce the cat efficiency by clogging the active sites.
That sounds fairly reasonable for an 18-year-old engine. Oil burning will affect the catalyst, it sounds like yours is just at the edge of losing efficiency. It's also possible your downstream O2 sensor is giving a false reading. (How old is it?) I'd try a commercial catalyst cleaning product.
A lot of times, the heater element burns out of the 02 sensor.
Very true. Easy to check with an ohm meter.
I would also run a couple of bottles of injector cleaner through it. Make sure you change your pcv valve with each oil change (5000 miles). Air filter too and clean the MAF sensor.
