'99 Maxima SE Oxygen sensor help!!!

[hwestling25]

I recently was given a '99 maxima sports edition as a hand me down car. Its a V6 twin cam and I LOVE this car, but the oxygen sensor is broken and now its getting worse gas mileage than my parents infiniti FX35. Can driving with a broken O2 sensor cause permanent damage to my engine and how can I convince my parents (who own the car) to replace it? They wont let me do any work on the car without their permission and I need some help from experts if Im going to convince my dad to replace the sensor. I know a little bit about cars but Im a girl and this is not my area of expertise. I have to put pretty much all of my money into my gas tank and I cant afford to drive it on a daily basis anymore. Please help!!!

[maxhopper]

Welcome to NICO.

When an O2 sensor goes bad, it goes into a default setting. The default setting is for the engine to run fuel rich so that no damage occurs to the engine from running too lean. The excess fuel not burned goes into the exhaust and can ruin the catalytic converter. An O2 sensor costs a hell of a lot less than a catalytic converter.

You have at least 3 O2 sensors on the vehicle, so you need to be sure which one it is. You can find O2 sensors pretty cheap through http://www.sparkplugs.com.

[NutriaforBreakfast]

Yes the faulty O2 sensor makes the engine use too much gas andcan ruin the catalytic converter, an expensive emmissions control device(approx $350).

Unburned fuel in the system can also created extra carbon. When thiscarbon is mixed with oil from the engine it creates this cruddy and oozystuff which collects on the intake manifold, spark plugs, and otheremmission control devices (EGR system) and further reduces the engineeffeciency.

Whats really bad is when you have all these problems together it costsa LOT more in labor because its hard to find the problem. Nothing beatssimply repairs and maintenance