I removed the EGR on our TD5 yesterday evening.
I was dreading trying to undo the two allen headed bolts on the exhaust manifold but they came out no problem at all.
Quite a lot of crap in the EGR valve but not as bad as some I have seen pictures of.
It's a 2000 model, so no CAT fitted.
It's a job to tell if there is a performance increase, it does seem to be going well, but is has been off the road for new air springs, gas shocks and steering damper, so the whole car seems to be much more up together.