Evening fellas,
Just put a third head on (that I got for free) in the hope that it would get things happening, but as I got it on and manually turned the motor over I heard a hissing noise. Now I'm only a young bloke and I'm working with bits and pieces of a manaul but I grew up in a workshop so I'm thinking that I'm losing all of my compression via the valves. I'm as broke as a junkie (that isn't a confession) and I don't have the dough to get the head completely reconditioned.
What I need to know is how much I should be looking at to buy a decent valve seat cutter (is that what you call it)?? Or whether I should just get one off hire (Kennards)??
Regards Chris

Don,t stress 2 much mate most motors will hiss as u wind them over by hand! Best thing to do is to beg,borrow a compression tester, with all spark plugs out, crank motor over using starter motor at least 5 times with foot flat on the accelerater, compression tester should show I guess anywhere from 140 to 200 depending on the condition of the motor ok anything less than this{unless u got a fairly decent cam in it}is pretty ornery and I,d prolly rebuild it ok

Check your tappets aren't too tight. I know a bloke who has the head skimmed on his 4K, and the found he had no compression. So he pulled the whole engine down.

Thanks guys, much appreciated!