So I cleaned up the intake manifold some w/ brake clean and a nylon brush then a small stainless steel brush.
As I did this I realised the crimped intake pipe to egr plate and it's vent pipe to pcv needed to come off. Again easy. Bolts were not tight. Oddly one was a 12m and one was a 13mm. But looking into the mouth of the pipe from the plate I could see it was pretty gummed up. For hahas i tried blowing into the pipe and and found it's totally clogged.
@Cgbeachbum, this pipe goes to the positive crankcase valve I linked you to that I'd cleaned out... thought I'd point it out again as the pipe itself on mine is crazy clogged. Hence cleaning the valve out will do squat if the vapours can't even vent thru the pipe off the carb base.
So my sleuthing has shown me that two fairly big factors in venting hot gasoline vapors from the carb out could have been huge contributors to my intake cracking. 1) My carb fan (doesn't work... knew that awhile back) and now I find my carb could not even adequately vent vapors due to the 2) PCV pipe being completely clogged.
And overall the surface of my manifold flanges look pretty good even before getting a good scouring.
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