# You know how when you're driving along and suddenly the car smells . . . **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 15, 2016, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276 "2016-01-15T21:09:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/1 "2016-01-15T21:09:50Z")
like someone cut the cheese? All this time I’ve been blaming it on whatever man I was riding with but today it happened while I was alone, and I didn’t do it. So what causes it? Or, if no one can answer, please at least someone tell me they’ve experienced the same phenomenon. \" A lot of other gas smells . . . " ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/2 "2016-01-15T21:13:32Z")
Catalytic converters have been known to smell like rotten eggs, I know at least around the late 1990s. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/3 "2016-01-15T21:22:31Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > Catalytic converters have been known to smell like rotten eggs, I know at least around the late 1990s. I thought most cars don’t have those anymore (or am I thinking of another part? Sorry to be a stooge). ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/4 "2016-01-15T21:24:20Z")
Dead skunk in the middle of the road. Stinking to high heaven. ---
**Author:** ![snowthx](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowthx/32/10660_2.png) [@snowthx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snowthx)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/5 "2016-01-15T21:29:25Z")
Maybe the person in the car in front of you let loose. (it wasn’t me). ---
**Author:** ![BobArrgh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobarrgh/32/2881_2.png) [@BobArrgh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobArrgh)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/6 "2016-01-15T21:40:15Z")
QUICK! Check the backseat! Or the trunk! ---
**Author:** ![BobArrgh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobarrgh/32/2881_2.png) [@BobArrgh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobArrgh)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/7 "2016-01-15T21:44:27Z")
Possible thread hijack, if so, I’m so sorry. Also, possibly way TMI … again, I’m so sorry. I knew a guy who worked for a mortuary in Hays, Kansas. He had to drive to Denver to pick up a body for embalming. The mortician forgot to warn him that due to the changes in altitude, there was going to be some release of gas. My poor friend was driving back home late at night when he heard the unmistakable sound of someone ripping off a bodacious fart. He about had a heart attack. After that, the body “farted” about 4 or 5 times. He said by the time he got back to Hays, he was an absolute nervous wreck. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/8 "2016-01-15T21:47:01Z")
Drove by a wastewater treatment plant or a sewer leak? I know that occasionally I’ve been walking in foreign cities and out of nowhere… FECAL STENCH!!! And then half a block later, it’s gone. I think it has to do with older sewer systems. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2016, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/9 "2016-01-15T21:55:06Z")
Did you drive by a paper mill? Those often smell like sulphur. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/10 "2016-01-16T02:30:39Z")
Ha! You guys are cracking me up! **BobArrgh** , your post / username combo is especially making me giggle 😛 In all seriousness (well, in whatever amount of seriousness can actually be mustered up for this particular subject), no, I wasn’t driving past anything that would be producing said stench; though I have driven past both a waste center and a paper mill in my time, and yes, they do indeed reek. So, no one else has experienced this? I think I might even be more interested in how common an occurrence it is than the why of the thing. I don’t recall it ever happening when riding in a car as a child with my parents or whatever. I first started noticing it when I was a teenager “riding in cars with boys” as it were. That’s why I mentioned that part in the OP; not to be dissin’ the mens, but it never seems to have happened when riding with my girlfriends. ---
**Author:** ![Obeseus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbce88/32.png) [@Obeseus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Obeseus)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/11 "2016-01-16T02:41:23Z")
Yes, I have noticed it and particularly in Toyotas. Occasionally happens when stepping on the gas while going uphill. ---
**Author:** ![AngelSoft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angelsoft/32/440_2.png) [@AngelSoft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngelSoft)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/12 "2016-01-16T02:50:30Z")
Right, my little PT Cruiser smells like burning plastic when I gun it going up a hill. It’s always done that and the car’s still running lol ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/13 "2016-01-16T03:00:39Z")
> [@AngelSoft](#): > > Right, my little PT Cruiser smells like burning plastic when I gun it going up a hill. It’s always done that and the car’s still running lol Shyea! Burning plastic would be a veritable bouquet as opposed to the sulphery, farty stench I’m talking about. I guess I’ve suspected on some level it’s engine related ( though not so much back in the day when on a first date or something. Awkward!)but it’s weird that until today I’ve never experienced it when riding alone. So, how many of you have looked askance at your date when the funk crept up? When I think of the times it’s happened and I’ve thought “_really, dude_?” I almost feel like I owe some people an apology. ---
**Author:** ![Dag\_Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@Dag\_Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dag_Otto)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/14 "2016-01-16T06:49:48Z")
> [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > I almost feel like I owe some people an apology. You can start with me. I could smell that one all the way over here! ---
**Author:** ![SacFly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9fc348/32.png) [@SacFly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SacFly)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/15 "2016-01-16T08:01:33Z")
When I’m driving back to New York City, that smell is how I know that I’m approaching Newark. ---
**Author:** ![AngelSoft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angelsoft/32/440_2.png) [@AngelSoft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngelSoft)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/16 "2016-01-16T08:13:03Z")
> [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > Shyea! Burning plastic would be a veritable bouquet as opposed to the sulphery, farty stench I’m talking about. I guess I’ve suspected on some level it’s engine related ( though not so much back in the day when on a first date or something. Awkward!)but it’s weird that until today I’ve never experienced it when riding alone. > > So, how many of you have looked askance at your date when the funk crept up? When I think of the times it’s happened and I’ve thought “_really, dude_?” I almost feel like I owe some people an apology. Oh I know the smell you speak of. My commute to work every day goes right by a shit pool, for lack of better words. The thing is the size of a small lake and literally feet from the highway. And in the summer they spray the pureed poop over the crops sitting on the other side of the highway. You sure something hasn’t been using your car engine as a toilet? ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/17 "2016-01-16T08:59:53Z")
> [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > I thought most cars don’t have those anymore (or am I thinking of another part? Sorry to be a stooge). Nope, every new gasoline burning car in the US has one. I believe the same is true for Europe now. If one is malfunctioning, it does have a strong sulfur (rotten egg) smell. OTOH, I drive by a gas well on the way to work every day. The last few weeks, it’s smelled like the world’s strongest taco farts. I imagine they have a leak somewhere. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2016, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-know-how-when-youre-driving-along-and-suddenly-the-car-smells/743276/18 "2016-01-16T09:02:54Z")
> [@BobArrgh](#): > > Possible thread hijack, if so, I’m so sorry. Also, possibly way TMI … again, I’m so sorry. > > I knew a guy who worked for a mortuary in Hays, Kansas. He had to drive to Denver to pick up a body for embalming. The mortician forgot to warn him that due to the changes in altitude, there was going to be some release of gas. My poor friend was driving back home late at night when he heard the unmistakable sound of someone ripping off a bodacious fart. He about had a heart attack. After that, the body “farted” about 4 or 5 times. He said by the time he got back to Hays, he was an absolute nervous wreck. To continue the hijack: My aunt worked in a morgue for awhile. The bodies gave off all sorts of farts and moans as rigor mortis set in and pushed out gas. The thing she never got used to was that the reflexes didn’t stop working for awhile. She’d accidentally brush the foot of someone who’s long dead, and they’d sit up with a loud moan.