Chasing Ghosts

You should have asked for the old egr cooler and intake manifold be returned to you. Same with the EGR valve and pipe.

Those can be cleaned while out of the car and swapped in later, when the "new" ones get fouled again. Taking your time to DIY, it's doable, even if it takes a couple of days (EGR cooler is especially a PITA).

Swapping in a pre-cleaned intake manifold and EGR cooler takes just as long as the remove and replace with new parts. In your case, that $1500 job will be $500 for labor only next time.

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Really!?? It takes me about four hours to clean 10-12 coolers and manifolds once they've been removed from the car. Pipes and valves are really quick.

 

An Oil Catch Can may "help" a bit, but the only solution is to clean periodically. It's a new design, 3rd gen was the proving ground, and 4th gen they did a number of revsions to the system. Meanwhile...

Anyway: get those old parts, in particular the cooler. Get them cleaned by the time you've done another 50k miles, do the cleaning/swapping again.

Cautionary note: with the advanced miles at which this was done, I'd suspect the head gasket is compromised. Keep an eye on coolant level.

 

He cleaned it inside his shop???? Wow. There's a mess waiting to happen. I use compressed air and then a pressure washer on the coolers. If they are stubborn, they soak in Purple Power. The pipes just soak in PP for a little while and then the pressure washer makes them shiny in a few seconds. I fill the intake manifolds with carb cleaner and let them soak for 30 minutes to an hour. Then scrub the ports with a small round brush before using the pressure washer on them. Absolutely not an indoor job. Rubber boots & apron, face shield and (for the dusty air part) a face mask. I still get soaked and my arms turn black, but it's the fastest and best way I know of so far to clean them in batches.