Catalytic converters and Cruisers

[jabxyz]

Guys, As I was crawling around under a car collectors cars yesterday a thought hit me. Catalytic converters began to be introduced into cars in the U.S. in the 70's. They were very wide spread throughout the U.S. by the 80's. (My car is a 1980). As I was talking with the collector about his cars and the engines that I was trying to source locally we were going over the years that the B, 3B and 13BT were all introduced into the Toyota lineup, basically the same time frame, late 70's through the late 80's. I tried searching cat converters and these engines and I never found a discussion of cat converters with any of these engines in particular, i.e. directly. Maybe that has to do with the fact that some of these engines were not available on vehicles imported for sale in the U.S. market, I'm not sure. As such I want to throw out several questions and hopefully this thread will shed some light directly on the subject. My goal is to find out now while I'm in this country and building this rig rather than have problems in my final days of this tour with shippers, freight fowarders, and customs and vehicle inspection folks back home.
1) Did either the B, 3B or the 13BT use cat converters? I would suspect that if used at all the B and 3B would have used at least one stage 2 converter and that the 13BT would have used either 2 stage 2 converters or one stage 3, but again not sure.
2) For those who were either running these engines as original or who have swapped them into their rigs, were you required to install a cat converter and if so what kind, stage 2 or 3, in order to meet emissions. I know that this state specific. I have asked a couple of guys in my home area (DC, MD, VA) and have gotten mixed responses.
In some cases the age of the rig grandfathered them out of emissions and in other the state said that the rig would have to meet emissions for a vehicle it's age??? I'd obviously like to run a clean, legal rig in the U.S. but not overbuild emissions into it so that the exhaust system gives me unending nightmares because it is so finicky.
3)What effect does running a cat have on your ability to run low sulfur diesel, biodiesel, SVO or WVO, etc? One of the best things about getting a diesel is that I could run just about anything for fuel. If I need to run a cat is that going to end this possibility? Thanks in advance for your responses. I realize that some of this crosses sections, i.e., the 60 and 80's series guys have a piece of it, as do the alternative fuel folks. I thought that the responses would be of general interest to all diesel heads.

[mac]

No cats on Mr.T diesels in the 80's/early 90's as far as I am aware. that's just my limited CDN experience talking though. I think NAmerican vehicles w/ diesels started seeing some cats in the mid 90's- VW comes to mind.

[UpsideDown]

No catalytic converters on diesels.

[jabxyz]

Originally Posted by UpsideDown

No catalytic converters on diesels.

That's interesting. I'm here because I don't know the answer but what I have read like the following seems to contradict your statement:
Catalytic converter - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Quoting the pertinent section "
Two-way catalytic converters

A two-way catalytic converter has two simultaneous tasks:

1. Oxidation of carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide: 2CO + O2 → 2CO2
2. Oxidation of unburnt hydrocarbons (unburnt and partially-burnt fuel) to carbon dioxide and water: 2CxHy + (2x+y/2)O2 → 2xCO2 + yH2O

This type of catalytic converter is widely used on diesel engines to reduce hydrocarbon and carbon monoxide emissions. They were also used on spark ignition (gasoline) engines in USA market automobiles up until 1981, when they were replaced by three-way converters due to regulatory changes requiring reductions on NOx emissions. Reduction of the NOx emissions requires an additional step. Platinum catalysis can be used...."


Additionally, in the '80 series section there are a number of posts referring to those guys running two stage 2 cats and the advisability of using Magnaflow after market cats as replacements on their diesels. I was confused when I checked the engine repair manual for the B series engines printed in 94. There was no mention of cats in that although given the references in the 80 series forums I suspect that I just don't have the emissions manual. As such from the above I gathered that cats of some kind were/are in use on post 1980 diesels currently being run in the U.S. hence my original post. Any help that you guys can give me on this would be appreciated.

[canucksafari]

You can find cats on early 1980 and 1990 Toyota diesels as aftermarket items for underground mine trucks. BTW, Wikapedia has been known to be wrong. If you want your 3B running near pollution free, it can be done for a bit of $$$. But why bother, you can run biodiesel.

[roscoFJ73]

I was looking at a cab chassis VDJ79 2008 model and dont recall seeing a cat on that either.
A lot euro diesels run them though

[Dougal]

The reason cats have only recently become useful is the temperatures needed to make them work.
They need to run hotter than your diesel exhaust is most of the time.
Modern diesels with variable vane turbos can drop off the boost to raise the exhaust temps and burn the cat or particulate filter (not the same thing) clean.

But without a computer controlled engine, a variable vane turbo and high enough engine load it won't happen, the cat will soot up and stop working.

[mac]

1995 VW Diesels have 'em and those are mechanically controlled injection pumps w'out a fancy turbo.

[Dougal]

Originally Posted by mac

1995 VW Diesels have 'em and those are mechanically controlled injection pumps w'out a fancy turbo.

According to turbomaster, some 95 TDI's have a GT1749V turbo which is variable vane, but other TDI's 94-97 use a GT1544S which isn't variable vane.
TurboMaster - Passenger Cars

The 90hp ones are wastegated, the 110hp ones are variable vane.

Which markets got which engine?

[mac]

I'm not referring to TDI's. In this market 3rd gen VW diesels up to 95 are fully mechanical, IDI, 1.9l, K03 turbocharger. They are catylized.

[Towpack]

MY LR Disco 300Tdi had a cat.It was a '95 model,the last of the mechanically injected models before they went over to EDC.My '98
1HD-FT'd 80 does not but then the fuelling on UK spec FT's was set very conservatively as standard.Don't know if this had any bearing on the fact.

[Dougal]

Originally Posted by Towpack

MY LR Disco 300Tdi had a cat.It was a '95 model,the last of the mechanically injected models before they went over to EDC.My '98
1HD-FT'd 80 does not but then the fuelling on UK spec FT's was set very conservatively as standard.Don't know if this had any bearing on the fact.

That's interesting.
The 300tdi disco's sold here I'm sure didn't and the japanese import 300tdi disco I've taken parts from didn't have one either. But the japanese V8 disco's were a different emissions spec to the ones sold new here.

Where was the cat fitted?

[Towpack]

Originally Posted by Dougal

That's interesting.
The 300tdi disco's sold here I'm sure didn't and the japanese import 300tdi disco I've taken parts from didn't have one either. But the japanese V8 disco's were a different emissions spec to the ones sold new here.

Where was the cat fitted?

The cat was in the front downpipe, from the turbo outlet to the mid-section.

[mac]

So, the answer is, all muddle aside, is you don't need to worry about a cat on a diesel Cruiser.