CATALYTIC CONVERTER SUBSTRATE SEEMS TO BE A "GOLDMINE"

see the many stolen cats threads here, from all over the world,

hey, at least these guys are actually buying them, and not cutting them off of peoples cars.

of course, that buying demand creates the criminal activity, but that isn't their fault.

a used cat is worth over $1,000. here

 

They may like to think that, but depending on the jurisdiction, they may find out differently.

Generally, the penalty would be lightest if they can very convincingly flutter their eyelids and say they had no idea what they were buying might be stolen.

And heaviest if they're in for over $5,000 or so of goods, or around 4 or 5 cats, say.

I don't know about the laws in Lagos.

 

I heard Toyota is now installing metal covers over them in some models. My friend has a new Camry Hybrid and it has a cover similar to my skid plate in my Tundra.
I haven't noticed it in my 21 Prius but will look for it next time I have it up on a lift. They do sell aftermarket things you can install yourself, too....it's shocking how fast they crooks can get under a vehicle and cut them right off....especially trucks with a foot of clearance like the Tundras.

 

These metals are sourced in Russia and China.

With the situation between Ukraine and Russia, the price will really go up and cat thefts will likely increase.

 

it would be funny if people were selling cats in an open market, but stranger things have happened.

but judging from the o/p,stolen cats don't seem to be an issue. yet.

 

Prices have gone way down recently... I'm kinda bummed I didn't jump on this opportunity when you could get $1500 cash for one. Same guy told me a couple weeks ago he can only offer $900 now. My theory is that the prices were so high for so long that corporations put tens of millions into profiting off of boosting supply and that prices aren't going to go back up again.

 

I don't speculate. I own shares of Exxon-Mobil. At $90 plus for a barrel of oil that just went up by $5 today, I will keep on collecting qualified dividends every year.

With inflation, US Treasury I Series Savings Bonds pegged to inflation are paying over 7 percent guaranteed.

 

i inherited some exxon from my dad, he was a huge fossil fuel guy. got it at 80 bucks a share, and i never thought it would recover during the pandemic.

the dividends are nice, but i have a sell order at 80 and will reinvest in solar and other tech that pays dividends.
no, they won't be 7%

 

The price of palladium has gone down by a fair margin over the past year. Being the most expensive of the precious elements in a cat it makes sense the price wouldn't be as high for an old cat today vs a year ago.

 

No special tool. People seem to be able to sleep through the god awful noise of a battery powered sawzall chopping through an exhaust pipe right outside there house.

I have heard a thief do that in person it’s crazy loud inside the house.
Woke me right up.

 

Sad part is a 2 way cat has no rhodium and much less rare earths and is excellent at breaking everything down except NOx
Water injection removes all NOx

Modern 2-way cats can even be free of all valuable metals and be made of iron oxide, ceramics and copper iodide

https://www.chemengonline.com/chementator-a-platinum-free-catalytic-converter/

Instead of stopping all vehicle production you would think we would instead consider alternatives that don’t use dangerous rare metals.

do we need to apply federal emergency authorization to pull our head out of our rear?
Same could be done with the chip shortage.

First world problems, we can build cars without chips but instead build nothing because the rules block us from using an older generation of chip.

We could decimate the rare earth market by using different tech but ma rules don’t allow it.

I would think in an emergency to get the pipes flowing we could temporarily authorize, it’s not like we haven’t in the past, Ford had special exceptions for its trucks, Tesla was excluded from new safety tests and ThinkEV got a hardship exception so it didn’t have to pass or even be tested by our current safety laws.