So for the past couple of weeks I have been trying to chase down a very loud and annoying “exhaust tick”. It started about the time our weather got cold so I assumed a crack in my exhaust manifold. Pulled the heat shield and low and behold it was cracked. Replaced it and still ticking. Got me worried so I pulled the intake and valve covers. Everything looked good so I put it back together and changed the oil with 5w30 instead of 5w20. Still ticking.... finally found the culprit. My EGR was broke. The cap in the bottom was loose and the bottom ear had cracked completely off. I pulled it and put a new one on tonight and NO TICK! This has been a pain to try and chase down and I haven’t seen anything about and EGR being cracked causing a ticking noise so wanted to share this with everyone. I’ll post some pics of my cracked manifold and EGR.

Cracked manifold

Broken EGR above bottom bolt

When I pulled the bottom bolt the ear fell completely off.

 

How many miles do you have? The cracked exhaust manifold isn't unusual, that's why I went with a lifetime warranty one. The EGR completely breaking that ear of off though.....that's odd.

 

160k miles

 

The cracked ear is still very odd but I replaced mine before 160k so maybe it didn't have time to fatigue like that. Thank you for posting your solution to the tick. It's absolutely something other owners will have in the future for the 3.8l.

 

My EGR gums up every 60k. It never gets old enough to fall apart like that. Wow.

I got 130k+ and no manifold cracks yet. Not looking forward to that. But overall can’t complain about the 3.8.

 

fivenote, when it gums up does it make the tick or do you just get a check engine light and a code?

 

looks like my EGR has done the same thing, thanks for the write up!