I bought a 1994 chevy/geo tracker a couple months ago, when i bought it, it needed a muffler and a few patches in the floor for inspection.  i found a muffler from an identical tracker from a guy in my town for $30, i replaced it and it worked great. 
i also added a ractive air filter as well, and it has worked fine for a month.  the valve cover gasket was leaking a little bit, so i replaced that with no troubles a couple weeks ago too.

yesterday i lifted the hood when i got home and the exhaust header was orange.  i figured my cat convertor must have clogged up, so i cut a hole in the bottom of it and cleaned it completely out, and left the hole in it and took it for a spin, figuring with a hole there, it couldnt heat up due to too much backpressure.  but its still doing it.. and i just noticed my valve cover gasket started leaking a bit in the back too.  not sure what to do from here.. i'm thinking i may have to just eliminate the convertor and run all new pipe to a new exhaust, because it just isnt working right.
the setup has 2 small pipes, maybe inch and 1/4 running into the cat, it comes out of the cat into 2 inch, which cuts back to maybe 1.75 inch to the muffler, then its maybe 1.5 inch the rest of the way back. i'm thinking i should run 2 inch or 2 1/4 right from the downpipe to the tailpipe.

anyone else run into this heating up problem?  my heat gauge isnt moving, it stays on normal the whole time, its just from the header to the flange that turns orange.

any help would be greatly appreciated, i'm stumped.

it definatley sounds like a clogged cat.  I run 2in from the manifold back into a cherry bomb with no cat.  Thats your best bet but if you live where emissions are taken very seriously then just get a universal high flow cat

It's running real lean, could be a bad egr valve, ecm not opening the injector, ect.

there arent any emissions laws where i live, just have to put a new cat on it for inspection in 12 months. no worries there.

would an egr valve off of a 4 cylinder firefly fit on the tracker? if it was the same i could test it as i have one junked here.

today i put on a new fuel filter and i cut the cat completely off, got some new 2 1/4 in exhaust and ran all new exhaust back to a cherry bomb and it is still doing it. 
an egr valve is $255.. dont really want to go down that road unless i have to.

jj,

Check out rockauto.com, (http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/raframecatalog.php) do a search for your vehical, I purchased my EGR from them, alot less then what I could've gotten here even with my brother working for an autoparts store. Looks like anywhere from $95.00 to 140.00 for a '94 Geo Tracker

You could try blocking off the egr valve just to see if it is bad or not, just pull it out and look at it and see what it would take to do it,you could also put your finger on it when you first start it and see if it gets hot when the engine is cold, if so it's bad, you could call hawk's for a used one.

my valve cover started leaking again, when i changed it i realized there was a seal broken in my throttle body.  i made a new gasket for it and it seems to have cooled down.. new valve cover gasket on it.. now i just need the torque specs for the valve cover bolts and i'll be able to try it again

I always thought the torque spec on a valve cover was 'about that tight'

yeah thats what i did.. finger tight plus one turn of a ratchet lol.
i thought we had the problem solved as there was a seal gone in the bottom of my throttle body.. fixed it and it seems to have helped a bit.  before i would drive for 10-15 minutes and it would be red hot, now its more like 25 minutes lol.

how much of a job is it to change an egr valve and what does it look like?  i know where there are a few junked trackers i could probasbly rob one off of.

i took out on of the plugs today.. by the look of it i wanted to see the rest.  all 4 plugs had pieces missing out of them. garbage bosch platinums.  i replaced them all with stock ngk's and it seems to pull and run alot better and smoother, but the manifold is still glowing red hot and i am starting to notice it getting harder on gas.  so my next question. does anyone know where i can get an o2 sensor for alot less than $160?  my local parts store can do $160.. with my discount.. regular 199.99.

any help would be great.

Did you check out
http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/raframecatalog.php

To find a vacuume leak check all your vacuume lines then listen carefully for a whistle or hissing, check to see if the injector is spraying nicelly. If you have a leak that is hard to find very carefully fog around your intake with propane or starting fluid the idle should rise and even out when you're close.
An EGR souldn't be hard it's on the outer end of the intake manifold, They can be easily cleaned (provided the exaust isn't to plugged) by getting it good and hot then slowly emptying a straw full of water into the intake through a vacume line especially one running to the #4 cylender. This will "steam clean" the carbon out you can use about a cap full of ATF with better results but be sure it's south of any mas air flow sensors and do it outside as it will quickly smoke out a shop or garage.
on our kicks the distributor oil seals are more prone to leaking than the valve cover gasket and it's a little hard to distinguish between the two, but they are cheap and will cure oil on the back of the engine.
If you have a pluged exaust it should loose power before dieing at idle and cause enough blow by to make all your seals purge. Check your PCV valve too, they are cheap, easy to install and on a used unit who knows when it was done last, this will also cause leaks.    NMc