Exhaust rattle driving me insane, anybody been through this?

[ursulazelah]

There's this metallic rattle under my Cherokee that shows up every time I go over bumps or accelerate from a stop, and it's gotten loud enough that my wife refuses to ride in it anymore. I crawled underneath over the weekend and the heat shield looks loose and one of the hangers seems stretched, but I couldn't tell if the muffler itself is starting to go because there's some surface rust on it too. Now I'm stuck between just zip tying the shield and hoping for the best, or actually getting it looked at properly. A buddy at the gym mentioned he'd found a reliable Jeep exhaust repair in Musaffah after his Grand Cherokee started droning on the highway, and he said the difference was night and day, so that got me thinking I should stop putting it off. My main concern is a shop that just welds whatever and sends you off, versus actually checking the whole system including the catalytic converter. Has anyone had a rattle like this turn out to be something bigger, and how much did the repair set you back roughly?