Egr

How often does the EGR tube and associated parts require attention?

Depends on the overall condition of the truck, maintenance history, driving habits, fuel quality, mileage, etc... I'd pull the EGR valve, clean it & all associated tubing atleast every 25000 miles on a 1998+. It's super easy & cheap to do. Mine was pretty black & nasty @ around 20K.
G/luck
Joel

Remove the egr and with compressed air, blow out the tubes in the intake wspecially the forward one. The end of that tube gets stopped up under the intake and trips a egr insufficient flow code on the OBDII computer.

vehicles driven by Guys normally get to 33,000 before requiring any attention womens vhicles about 20-28,000 as men tend to drive a bit harder and women usually a bit slower causing the old carbon deposits to settle in quicker