I am hoping that the real source of my leaks has been 2 main areas:
1. The grommet pictured above. I went ahead and removed the valve covers and ordered new gaskets (although the ones on it looked to be in fine shape). While I had the covers off, I RTV'd the inside of the grommet. It spun freely before and it appeared oil was making its way between the grommet and the valve cover. I also added lock washers to the valve cover bolts.
2. On the other side, once I removed the upper intake, I found that the hose connecting the upper intake to the PCV filter hole in the back of the lower intake had blown completely off the upper intake. I have a feeling that was where a majority of my leaks were coming from. I had been noticing an unusual amount of "backfire" at certain air/fuel/coast/acceleration siuations recently so hopefully this fixes that issue as well. I added a hose clamp to ensure it does not come off again.
In addition, I decided to also change the header gaskets as I felt I was getting some exhaust leaks and also kept having my header bolts loosen up. The gasket I added is suppose to compress up to 50% but will also expand back if needed. It is "guarenteed" to fix exhaust leaks (we will see). I also swapped my header bolts out with some locking bolts that are desgined to NOT loosen up.
Will hopefully have it all back together tomorrow with an oil change and can see if I was successful in diagnosing the major points of leaking. Between the PCV hose not attached to the upper intake, the dipstick tube loose, and the grommet on the other valve cover now sealed-- I am really hoping this captured most of it!!
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