SOLVED: Bad battery.
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I'm driving a 2006 LR3 V8 with 69,000 miles.

Out of the blue a few days ago, there is a strong, repugnant rotten egg smell coming from my engine bay and exhaust. You can smell it 10 feet away from the vehicle. I have never had any smell of sulfur previously to this.

I know this is typically related to the catalytic converters.

My Faultmate shows zero codes coming up.

Did perhaps I fill up my tank with some bad fuel, or should I be worried?

I've read around on various forums looking for an answer. And some people suggest it's a faulty fuel injector. Other people are saying it could be a bad O2 sensor. Other people are suggesting it's caused by a bad air/fuel ratio.

Also, I'm reading that if this problem isn't immediately fixed, it could destroy your cats.

I like working on the Landy myself. So, for now, I'd prefer to not bring it into a dealer.

What would cause the cat(s) to emit this smell?

If this does turn out to be a bad catalytic converter. Why would it fail at 69K miles of normal driving?

I don't want to just install a new cat (or two?) and have it happen all over again. What exactly would cause this to happen?

If I need to buy some tools, I will, such as a fuel injector pulse tester or whatever.

Perhaps Roverguy7, being the respected guru around here, you can chime in on what I should be looking for / testing to find the cause!

 

Hrm it seems catalytic converters in the USA are warrantied for 8 years or 80k miles.

I don't want to have a new one installed only to have the same problem happen all over again. Does anyone have any ideas what would cause one to go bad?

 

How sure are you that it is coming out of the exhaust?

Just about anything that could cause this to be fuel related, would give you a fault code. I have seen a few times the alternators overcharging the battery, and causing it to overheat and vent too much gas (sulfuric acid)

I would take a visual look at the battery, make sure it's not cracked, and check for any signs of acid or wetness around it.

 

I smell it strongly at the front of the vehicle and then at the rear. I don't know if the wind/air is moving to the rear and that's why I smell it there, or if it's actually coming from the exhaust. I'll run the vehicle today and smell the exhaust pipes to see if it's actually coming out of there.

I'll also unbolt the battery top mounting bar clamp today and lift the battery up and inspect all around for what you mentioned.

Roverguy7, also you helped me out a short while ago with the self fuel injection cleaning I did. I somehow managed to flood out the engine and the brand new spark plugs I had just put in were soaked in gasoline. I cleaned / dried them off and followed the clear flood procedure you taught me how to do.

However, I've been reading online that fouled plugs can cause this happen. I'm wondering if this is the cause of it all. I'm going to order a new set of plugs today and see if that does the trick.

And I checked this morning to see if there were any codes yet. And still not a single code coming up. So, I'm really perplexed.

 

On older vehicles with less efficient cats, sulfur smells can be caused by too much fuel, or poor ignition allowing too much fuel into the exhaust. These cats are pretty good at fully burning the fuel coming in, so you don't get the same results.

I doubt that flooding the engine has anything to do with this. Once the flood was cleared, the fuel burns off quickly, after a mile of driving, anything that the flood did in the first place was gone.

I could see the cat causing this smell, but you would only smell it at the rear of the vehicle then, and would probably have some smoke along with it. I think you are looking battery, and if so, check the charging system fully, while driving is best, I can walk you through how to pull up battery voltage display on the radio to make it easy.

 

I'm not having any of the above issues but I would like to know how to get the battery voltage and any other trick item to display on the radio.

Thanks,

 

Radio off.

Turn it on, press and hold other ****, about 10 seconds, release when display changes.
You will enter the first menu with somewhat useless information.

Press and hold RH **** again, release when screen changes. This menu has a lot of good information, but I'm not going into what all it means. If you scroll through the screens, by turning RH ****, you will come to one that shows the voltage. It has 6? PIDs displayed, top right is current voltage. Top left is radio cutoff voltage.

 

Roverguy, I think you are right about it being the battery. It's not my cranking battery. But, I have an auxiliary second battery. And it's damp around the vent tube and it has a sulfur smell emanating from it. I'm going to remove the aux battery this afternoon and drive around and see if the smell is gone.

You always seem to know the answer to my Landy troubles. Thanks, man.

 

MoShadeTree, I followed Roverguy7's instructions and here's what the voltage display looks like:



Pretty neat and easy to access.

 

I've had the aux battery out for a few days and the sulfur smell is gone.

Thanks, roverguy7. Once again you pinpointed the problem.