The actual question is at the end...

Is the bolt holding the manifold to the exhaust pipe literally the hardest part of the job of removing the intake so I can do the fuel lines, delivery valve crush washers/o rings and the glow plugs if I wanted? That was essentially a breeze.

Removing the wiper reservoir was easy, getting the intake manifold bolts out along with a couple vacuum lines and the accordion pipe bolt/bracket was easy, and getting to and removing the bolt underneath the car was easy. The hardest part was getting the splash shields out of the way that have been cobbled together after years of scraping on things, being removed for oil changes, bolts being lost, etc. If I had a longer extension and didn't have to put together every extension I could find, I could have gotten the bolt off even quicker. Mine has an allen head bolt in there though, so I'm guessing the original was lost long ago and replaced with a similar bolt.

Is the underneath bolt or the corrugated egr pipe supposed to be the devil to remove? Because once I had all the appropriate bolts out of the way, one good wiggle and my entire intake manifold popped right off. Now I just have to figure out how I'm going to attack these other parts.

Anywho, now that the manifold is out of the way, I could use a plan of attack to make sure I don't get in my own way and do something out of order and have to redo it:

I'm replacing all the fuel lines in the area, the delivery valve crush washers and o rings, and the o ring on the back of the fuel pump shutoff valve (which is where I think my leak and losing prime is coming from), the fuel pump shutoff valve, and there's probably another 1 or 2 o rings in there somewhere.

Intake manifold is bolted to the exhaust pipe?

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CENSORED due to not family friendly words

I guess I meant the intercooler pipe...I should have known better as I've had multiple turbo cars lol Either way...the big pipe there coming up from the bottom of the car lol

Access it from underneath with long extension

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Jim

Well I just dove in and haven't gotten in the way of myself yet. Replacing the fuel lines isn't so hard. I'm going to have to go to the parts store and get a fuel hose clamp for the looooong feed hose as the old one is connected with a fancy clamp near the firewall. The only other hose I don't have a way to do right now is the one that has the banjo bolt on one end and pushes into the fuel filter area. If anyone knows what size wrench I need to get on it I'd pick one up at the store and some proper crush washers but my tool set only goes up to 15mm and that's not big enough, and I can't get a socket on it to go that route.

If you get a tune and delete the EGR the intake removal is a complete breeze.

On my om606 I made up a long T handled allen key to get easier access and this worked very easily .
My intercooler pipe was easy to refit because the bracket at the lower steady bracket was broken so intercooler pipe could be wiggled around easier to get it to fit.
I did have one instance where the pipe blew off under hard acceleration but a new bolt on the pipe / manifold join sorted that problem out.