Okay... I had to educate myself a little, but I'm back to argueing again...
This is what I found out !
Quote:
The precious metal catalyst is bound to an extruded ceramic honeycomb
substrate. The ceramic has hundreds of flow channels that allow the exhaust
gasses to come in contact with a maximum amount of surface area where the
catalyst reaction takes place. The catalyst must come in direct contact with the
exhaust gasses for the reaction to take place.
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And this is where I found that info.. and a little more
http://www.bobsmuffler.com/conv_works.htm
Of Course everyone knows that's Bob's Muffler.com is the ONLY place to Go with your Automotive Queries. .... It was the first thing to come up okay !
But it's enough to prove my thought process. Basicly if you open up a Catalytic Convertor, it is jammed packed with all this ceramic coated layers and layers and layers. The only description I've heard before is from my 7th grade sceince teacher who suggested taking the darn thing off for better gas milage (great earth freindly science teacher) He said it looks like a million little BB's that just fall all over the place.
now with the proven fact that your exhaust gases have to pass through all this crap. You can't say that this isn't the MOST restrictive part of your whole exhuast system. I forget who it was, but one of you speed junky's even told some new person not to buy a 5-zigen exhaust, becuase the extra bend being all slanted, was unnecessary and caused extra restriction. Well if that extra bend is restrictive your CAT is 500 times worse.
I'm not claiming straight piping the cat will give you 45 Hp... but It is definatly going get you more than puttin on a free flow muffler.
And to quist's credit... (learned this on the page also) most cats have a pre warmer thing that heats the air, Warm air moves faster. But this got me thinking... If I can keep the Pre warmer and take out the ceramic honeycomb layers... it'll be that much better.
So anyway... I'm going bore my CAT , and gain 50 HP outa it... and slap another Really Huge Type R sticker on my Car... you all can do what you want.