Ecomodding a minivan
 

Hi folks.

We recently sold our 2012 Town and Country and went down to an 07 Honda Odyssey (this was able to eliminate our payment: I hate car payments.) The Honda is also pretty much trouble free and the Chrysler was starting to throw some red flags.

Anyway: The Odyssey doesn't get the fuel economy the Chrysler did (no VVT), and it makes me ache to figure the mileage and come up with about 20. Granted my wife has a lead foot, but I would still like to make it better.

I'm going to play with a WAI, and maybe a front air dam and grille block, any other suggestions that will be relatively hard to see. My wife has something of an appearance stigma, she hates my Geo because it looks old and "Junky," so I need to keep the van looking fair close to factory.

Before it's suggested I'm already planning plugs, wires, O2 sensor, and new tranny fluid as the previous owner didn't have any records on any of it, and they (should be) cheap to do just because.

Back to say, I just looked up the procedure to make sure there's nothing stupid (the T&C you have to take off the intake to do the rear spark plugs, or so says the dealership), and I see this one is coil on plug, so I guess no wires to worry about.

Shouldn't be any plug wires, they're coil on plug.

I wouldn't do an O2 unless it's throwing a code.

Up tire pressure and when it's time, get some LRR tired. That's the low hanging fruit. Some underbody panels will help but not as much as driving a little slower.

I've always been under the impression that upstream O2's should be replaced every 20K as a maintenance item. Downstream O2's I just bypass if they throw a code, no emissions inspections where I am, and this van is our only vehicle with a functioning catalytic converter.

I did come back to say I found out they were coil on plug, I didn't know that yet when I first posted: I haven't dug into this van much as we just finally broke 50 degrees in sunlight yesterday up here.

Huh?

Mine is original at 260k

That's what I was taught, and I've read as much here too, lots of the guys here replace the O2 sensor on a car they buy by default. I would think a bad upstream O2 sensor a lot of times wouldn't throw a code, especially when there is only one of them.

My Insight's was original at 250k also, and was in working order. Good thing too, since they're like $200. The downstream sensor should throw a code if it disagrees with the upstream sensor, and I'm almost certain the Odyssey has a downstream one.

https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/...2)+sensor,5132

O2 sensor for my odyssey is like $20. The downstream O2 sensor exists only to see if the catalytic converter is working, so actually it will throw a code if the two agree, which would indicate a catalyst failure

The downstream does act to see if the catalyst is working, but it will also throw a code if the gasses getting past the first aren't right. It's often the case that a catalyst efficiency code is actually a failing upstream O2.

That makes sense. So if the upstream is running things rich, it won't all get burned up in the cat and this will trip the downstream? I've never heard of that before, but most of the stuff I've worked on was pre-OBD2, and/or hasn't had cat problems.