If the cylinder walls are dry, they could lead to a low compression bad enough it won't start. Try taking the plugs out and siphoning (or similar) a couple teaspoonfulls of motor oil into each cylinder and crank it over a few times before reinstalling the spark plugs. It'll smoke pretty badly for a few minutes if it does start.

Already did. That's how you find out whether it's the head or the cylinder. If it goes up with oil, it's rings. If it doesn't go up, it's valves. Either way, it's drastically low.

Try working on something for three years, in the sun, rain, and snow until your hands bled.

Spend a few more dollars

http://www.allegro.cc/forums/thread/603069/850173#target

for thier lack of honor, go back to the machine shop and exspress your self. Dont hold that stuff in or inacent people mite have to pay .

Oh man, that really sucks. I don't presume you could walk into that service and throw it on their head.

That sucks man.

You put the head upside down, fill the combustion chambers with kerosene or similar, and wait to see if the ports get wet. A good valve job shouldn't require "testing" though. As far as cracks into the coolant passages, they generally cover all the coolant openings with rubber blocks and apply vacuum to one opening and see if it drops due to a leak.

Moral of the story: don't pay $600 to get some head.

But yeah. That must suck. All that wasted time and ruined expectations. My condolences.

Which reminds me of this video.

$300 to rebuild the head, from what I remember all the exhaust valves were changed but the intake ones were deemed fine and I don't believe they changed the valve stems. The cams were almost new already so I told them to keep them and just polish them to get rid of the rust.

The other $300 was to assemble the bottom end (bearings, pistons, piston rings, etc.) I did the balance shafts myself.

I waited over a month for each of the jobs to be done. I called every week and they kept telling me it wasn't done yet. I was so pissed.

I'm going to make sure it's their fault and not something I did (improperly torqued head gasket, or a cracked block from having not evenly mixed water+coolant over a winter cycle) before I talk to them about it. But if it is due to poorly seating valves, than I'm going to ask for my money back for both jobs. I'm not going to ask for any more than that, however, the damage is already done.

As many good memories I had with this car, if it's over, it's over and I'll be ditching it. It's just really sad to toss or sell off a brand new set of pistons, oil pump, hydraulic tensioner and timing setup, water pump, ignition wires and plugs, and God only knows what else.

It's also really sad to loose all of the extra work I put into it. I replaced the engine mounts but the ones I couldn't get, I had to make my own out of polyurethane. I also made a spacer plate for my transmission out of ultra-high molecular weight polyurethane. And tons of connectors, studs, and bolts I had to custom cut, thread, and make. It's a 20 year-old car after all.

Gosh, and all the time fixing the suspension and dropping in a new power steering rack and clutch.

Yeah, typo on my part.

False. Implied warranty of workmanlike quality.

I hate it when people throw around a headline and pretend they know a damn thing about the actual story.

http://lawandhelp.com/q298-2.htm
Specifically, note that McDonald's brewed their coffee much hotter than industry standards -- and although that site doesn't mention it, hotter than the maximum suggested by coffee trade associations. And in cases concerning negligence, trade is taken into account and McDonald's has a legal duty to act as "a reasonable coffee vendor ought to act", which they clearly failed to do.

See also the legal duties owed to invitees under tort law:

Yeah, I took a business law class at community college. What's up.

Consider it an Odyssey; a journey taken not for the pleasure of the destination, but the thrills and experience of the adventure itself.

Just trying to cheer ya up.