Toast, yeah, it has EGR. The function as I understand it, is to lower combustion chamber temperatures by introducing a small amount of exhaust gases (which are inert) back into the intake stream at certain load conditions. Because that gas stream is sooty, it jams up the small ports used something fierce. When I pulled the EGR valve off, I was getting "supply" of exhaust through the bottom port, so at least it's making it that far, but nothing was getting past the valve, which I cleaned and verified function of with my Mighty Vac, because the intake manifold is plugged up with [censored]. The port leads to orifices under the carburetor and should be free-flowing. The only reason I know this is because I cleaned the heck out of the manifold on Jorge's '86 when we were going though it last year, otherwise I wouldn't have a clue as to how this works. One thing did surprise me, though: it has no oxygen sensor. Rock Auto lists one for this vehicle, but there's no port on the manifold and no wire for connecting one that I found.

HazT, thanks for the heads up on seats. I suppose we'll take a closer look at how they bolt in and then we can start scouting the yards for some snazzy replacements. These are tore up from the floor up, as the kids say.

The manifold crack is a straight line, thin, and extends straight out from #3 cylinder, maybe two inches. Because this JB Weld stuff is a putty-like form, I'm thinking it's too stiff to get in to a thin crack like this, but my tiling experience says if I force it into the crack at a 90 degree angle as if I was grouting tile, I can at least get something in there. I won't spend too much effort on it since we have two later model manifolds to replace it with when it's time to fix it right.

I'm going to get all fancy with some caliper paint and do up the front brakes in shiny red. Of course, due to my laziness, it will be shiny red over bumpy, unsanded and rough calipers that won't be surface prepped beyond cleaning with brake cleaner. I figure since I'm putting in new brake pads, I can go the extra few bolts and take off the brackets and undo the calipers to paint them. The brakes need to be bled anyway. Bring the bling.

John B.