Beretta.net

my friend has had problems with his 96 beretta since his dad bought it. mostly misfires and rear 02 sensor faults, now that the car is his things are going to change.  i solved the misfiring problem, but since it was dumping fuel into the exhaust it melted some of the ceramic in the cat. since his car is a 96 you cant just knockout the cat and be alright like my car. he dosn't want to buy a new cat so he asked me to look for alternatives, this is what i found:  o2 sim

my questions: has anyone used these before? do they work? and do they shut off the MIL light?

my friends inspection ran out last month and he needs his car back quick!

For what that second sensor does, I do not see why this wouldn't work to trick the car in thinking that the cat is alright.  
Tricking the car into thinking everything ok is not the point, a light readout is for a reason.  If replacing the part with a new one doesn't fix anything, then this trick will not fix the problem either, just mask it.
This part is for people that want to remove the cat without having the SES light turning on, that is it, there is no other use for it then that.
You should be more concerned with the problem itself then being botherd by the warning light being on.

If your only concern is this light, then yes, this part will solve that problem.

the bad cat is one of the reasons the MIL light is on, and if it will not pose any problems to anything else then i guess it'll have to do. thanks

another 96 beretta owner has tried a caspers 02 simulator and it didnt work for them.  Good luck.

Not to mention....

QUOTE Effective 8/2/2006
At a recent meeting of the Board of Directors, Casper's Electronics, Inc. executives have decided to discontinue the sale of, support for, warranty of, and all affiliation with the O2 Simulator product line. We will be focusing our resources on new and exciting products for the high performance aftermarket automotive industry!

If it is a 96 it should have OBD2 right. If it does then you could find someone to just turn off the error code to get the light to go away. But if it requires an emission test then he will need a new cat.

I wouldn't use o2 sims because I have read that the rear o2 sensors help with long term fuel trims and if you use sims your car will end up running like crap over time. Not sure if it is true but I wouldn't want to risk it.

I tried an O2 Sim on my 96Z, ended in trouble. As soon as i turned the key to the ON poss, the Simulator caught on fire.... Hummm. WTF! Had to fork over like $135 for a rear O2.

BLK96Z wrote:I tried an O2 Sim on my 96Z, ended in trouble. As soon as i turned the key to the ON poss, the Simulator caught on fire.... Hummm. WTF! Had to fork over like $135 for a rear O2.

I hope that was with the cost of labor. If not you got hosed......

It was. The sensor was original with 170K on it and was so rusted on the pipe, i said F*%# that and had a shop do it. didnt feel like playing with it.

i had an o2 simulator (rear) and it worked great. I would recommend one if you can't afford a real one.

I hate those things... one I tried worked for 5 seconds... Now I just have that code shut off, since my pipe doesn't even have a spot for a O2 back there anymore.

the reason most of them don't work or catch fire is because the power and one of the grounds are switched on out 96's for some reason. Luckly the company i got mine from had a customer with a beretta get one before and it fried so they figured out the problem and made a revision just for the beretta.

Still much easier and cheaper for me to shut off the code and leave it unplugged... I still pass emissions too

i guess thats true if you know someone with a tuner that will do it for cheap

People that I could get access to their car I'll do that for free... its the tuning and other stuff that I charge for.