Ok ebay or self-made hm... any idea how thick it should be if self-made? Oh will look on ebay and see how thick they are. I think I have some aluminum plate somewhere. Will check dimensions and plan ahead. THANK YOU for the help!!!

Wondering if the plate can be put in, and then the EGR re-attached, maybe longer bolt lengths required - will find out as this is something I'd really like to try doing but would rather have it be reversible just in case it causes more problems than it solves. Will update when i get to this stage, too!

The truck is parked in the driveway right next to the house, about oh... 3 feet between the exhaust tip and the white house. Nice black spot of soot on the house before I washed it away. Major soot. Even some down on the cement where the condensation was falling. Disgusting really feel bad for that little engine. Not sure how much would keep coming out if I let it idle for long, but anyway want to definitely try eliminating it soon. Will look into cleaning the #4 port I think it was VERY soon, must be a crap load in there stored up.

Got the CARFAX back for the truck and yes, only 91k on the dial. No bad news. The only thing I can figure is it must have never ever been anyone's "only" vehicle. Always a back up never a main. Never left this little area my god what a boring life -- UNTIL NOW mwhaha!!!

Between you & Brad, and then some more, I've got reading material for hours, already a lot gone through, making notes & such, going to be an awesome summer, thank you so very much for sharing so much incredible info!!!

Dying for higher mpg since the bf INSISTED on an automatic... so I'm switching from driving a 5spd to auto, will be interesting, ugh. Almost insured it today but found the leak, so... that's gotta be done first. I don't want to encourage driving it until it's 'right'. Or at least right enough to not have any problems causing further problems. Sort of getting attached to it already. Am excited to test out the EGR elimination to see what it does. Of course I should drive it around a bit first, lol, getting ahead of myself.

*offtopic: Any idea on the size of the butterfly nut that goes on the air filter cover? Missing & can't figure it out from the book/specs anywhere.