1997 Chevy Venture

FOREVERLOST

MEMBER
1997 CHEVROLET VENTURE

1997 Chevy Venture 6 cyl

My mom's van has been having problems. If it sits over night it drives fine for the first time you go somewhere but if you try to drive it again it dies. It idles fine but its very sluggish and dies if you go to far or to fast. One shop said it is nothing with the exhaust system and auto zone did the free test thing and it came back with an o2 sensor code and a catalyitc converter code. Thats why I took it too the exhaust place. They said that wasn't the problem and I don't know what else to try! Please help!

1 Reply

FREEMBA

MECHANIC
1,152 POSTS

The exhaust shop needs to do a "back pressure test" on the exhaust system in order to determine if the catalytic converter is clogged. 1.5 psi or more of back pressure indicates a partically clogged exhaust system.

Your van has two 02 sensors. One in front of the catalytic converter and the other behind it. The first reads raw exhaust and the rear one reads the exhaust after it's been treated by the catalytic converter. The computer compares these two reading to dtermine if the catalytic converter is porperly reducing the amount of pollution coming out of you exhaust. If a problem is spotted the computer turns on the "check engine light."

Technicians have sophisticated diagnostic equipment to read/graph these 02's so that they can make informed decisions. However, without these they would replace the rear sensor and see if vehicle performance improved. I recommend that you have the back pressure test before replacing anything.