I would say thats the gasket

 

Sounds like bent valves. Do a leakdown test for sure.

 

Just pressurize the cylinder, you will know really quick which valves are leaking. Listen for air rushing out the intake or exhaust.

 

After reading back, no spark plus low compression across the board is likely cam timing. It has not run since it was built?

Did you remember to install the trigger wheel before installing the timing cover?

 

What is a trigger wheel billman?
I just finished rebuilding my s2k an started it for the first time last night. Forgive it down the road before I heard some nasty knock and it shut down. Pushed it back to the house and pulled the valve cover off. I forgot to put bolts in the cam gear . Horrible mistake, idk how I forgot. I got lucky though and put it all back together and it's running fine now.

 

Sorry for the long time getting back to you on this, I've been trying to get another car running in the meantime and it's being a pain as well.

Probably a silly question here, but the parts you're referencing are all below the head, right? We didn't tear into anything on the bottom end. From what I remember, we left the timing chain suspended while we had the head off, but I didn't do most of the major work on it tearing it down or putting it back together.

Our marks are all right where they should be, and even with the rocker arms loosened up, there's still compression getting from one cylinder to another. As far as I know the valves are alright, I wasn't informed of any valve issues by the shop that did the work on the head to get it back in spec.