2004 Dakota Quad-Cab 4X4 exhaust manifold

First let me admit that I'm pretty stupid, when it comes to being a
fanatic on having a clean vehicle. I'm pretty sure that stupidity is
what caused this problem. I just cannot stand to drive around for any
length of time, in a filthy vehicle. I make sure that everything is
just as clean as the day it came from the assembly line, as much as I
possibly can. It's an illness, I guess. I plan no treatment for this
disorder, and just need to keep fixing the issues that it causes,
which brings me to my issue of the month:

I have an '04 Dakota 4X4 that has really served me well. It's a 4.7
engine, with automatic transmission. I bought it from a financial
institution after it had been repossessed. It was a sealed-bid affair,
and only two bids were received, mine and a relative of the chairman
of the credit union board of directors. Anyway, it was a great deal
less expensive than one might think.

The previous owner was quite a drinker, and had inflicted a fairly
large amount of light damage that I thought I could repair on my own.
It had accumilated 48,000 miles before I took possession, and I
immediately did all the maintenance and repair, before putting her on
the road. Once I got it, I spent a little over a grand fixin' her up,
and I've put nearly 40,000 additional miles on her since. It's been a
very good vehicle up until recently, when I discovered that I have at
least one warped exhaust manifold. It sounds as though it's the left
(driver's side) head of the engine that's making the noise.

It probably came along after I washed the engine after a long, hard
winter. Usually, I don't do that, unless the engine is cold, but this
time I was in a hurry, and tried to be careful around those manifolds,
but apparently not careful enough. Pretty dumb, ehh? Okay. Now it's
time to pay the piper, and fix the tick-tick-tick noise, which only
lasts a few seconds, when you first start the engine, lasting only
until it warms enough to mate the manifold/gasket/head after things
warm sufficiently to rejoin them.

I thought it may have only been the joint between the exhaust manifold
and the exhaust pipe that leads down to the cat, so I took it to my
local muffler shop, and they tell me that it's at least one broken
manifold stud/bolt, and that their estimate for repair starts at
nearly $850, if everything goes smoothly. If not, it could run well
into the $1000+ range, and the sky's the limit, (at least until I
scream, "Uncle, Uncle, . . . here, let me pay you and take my broken
truck home!). Needless to say that's not in the family budget, and I
need to tackle this issue on my own, and tear this monster down and
fix this issue, without paying someone all that labor to keep it from
going "tick-tick-tick" for the initial warm-up period, every day.

I've looked at the whole repair issue from a DIY perspective, and I
can see no real shortcuts to getting this task completed. With all
that 4X4 stuff in the way, taking this exaust manifold off and pulling
out the broken stud/bolt could be something I really may be in over my
head on. Don't get me wrong, I have a lot of mechanical experience,
and have pulled, repaired, and replaced innumerable heads, manifolds/
headers, engines, but I'm getting a little older, and the contortions
necessary may be more than I want to go through, if there's a simpler
solution.

Anyone got any shortcuts to fixing this issue with a minimum amount of
effort, because at this point, short of removing the driver's side
front fender and liner, (and even that appears to involve moving
almost all the electrical stuff -- battery, fusebox, ECU, etc -- out
of the way), I see no easy solution to this issue, and may not be up
to tackling such a task? Is there some way to avoid having to
dismantle half of the front clip to get at this problem?

I should note that when I work on things like this, I work very
slowly, making sure that each step is completed properly, before
moving ahead to the next step. It's probably my 63 years of being a
motorhead, who doesn't hurry to fix anything, but tries to fix it
correctly, in every case. Is there any harm in just ignoring this
issue, until it gets worse? How soon will that happen, if anyone can
venture a guess?

God Bless,
Dan'L