That sounds great

If his valves are adjusted too tight at the rockers, he would be getting less compression and less power, is it possible that you heard the rockers' rattling, or is his a hydrolic lifter set up (perhaps the lifters have collapsed?).

They were hydraulic and I put eyes on the side that had the tapping sound. It didn't appear to be bad but they were all tight, which, to my understanding, is how hydraulic valves should be. I've never dealt with them and I've never adjusted them, so I didn't stick my hands in there to mess it up. I did get them at TDC to see if they tops looked even and they all did.

I just got caught up on this. Let me know when the next session is-be glad to help!

ok so we found out that the "other" black wire is a temp sensor someone added to the drivers side. the correct one must be bad. so i ordered a new one. waiting on that part.

in the mean time i sent the fuel injectors off to be rebuilt. 2 of them were not doing so hot according to the test results.

reinstalled injectors today.

starts up fine.

.....but still no power in 3rd or 4th gear .... and sluggish in 1st and 2nd

already done :
fuel pump
fuel filter
electronic ignition to replace points
plugs
wires
cap
button
timing set

i really dont mind spending the money on the above. kinda needed to be done anyway i guess. but, now i just dont know what else it could be......
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and.....  no compression on #4
plus oil on #4 plug

No compression can mean a few things. It either means that the compression is leaking out around the rings and into the crank case or it means that it is leaking out somewhere else. The somewhere else, like a valve, or a bad head sealing surface, etc...

Now, since it has no compression, that would lead me to believe that a valve is held open instead of bad rings. This can be good or bad. Type IV heads are bad about dropping the valve seat, which is the hardened metal ring that the valve seals against. Because the seat is steel and the heads are aluminum, the metals expand at different rates and eventually the seat can pop out. When it pops out, the valve cannot fully retract back into place and seal (imagine something stuck in a door, prevent it from closing all the way). This can only be fixed with a new head and I believe HAM Inc (Len Hoffman) is the best way to go, but its not necessarily cheap!

Now, that is a worst case scenario and it could be a loose or tight adjuster or something else. I'd start by pulling off the drive side valve cover and remove the rocker on the number 4 cylinder. Lay a straight edge across the two valves and see if one of them is pull into the head a little bit. That one is your culprit of the above scenario. Put eyes in that area and report back.

Its not impossible

You don't want to drive it like it is, because if that valve grenades, you will need a new bottom end too.

Does the engine have excessive blow-by? (remove the oil filler cap with the engine running . . . if lots smoke blows out, that's blow-by).  If so, that indicates compression getting past the rings.  That would explain oil on the plug as well.  However, if it's just worn rings or a broken ring, you should have LOW comression, not NO compression.  No compression is usually a valve problem.  Or, a dropped valve seat that's held the valve opened enough for the piston to hit it and it's knocked a hole in the piston.
To see if the rings are the culpret, put some oil in the spark plug hole and recheck the compression.  If the compression comes up some, that would indicate a problem with the rings.
Like Nick said, it could be a lot of things . . . some minor and some major.  From what I've read in this post, I would suspect the compression is getting past a valve (almost always an exhaust valve) or escaping between the head and cylinder.  I don't think it's a dropped valve seat . . . that usually makes a lot of noise.  It could just be a valve is adjusted too tight.  Do what Nick said . . . remove the rocker, and look at the top of the valve stems.  If they sit level, reinstall it and adjust the valves (no idea how to do that with hydraulic lifters on a bus, but there are others here that can guide you on that).  If that doesn't fix it, you probably need to pull the engine and pull the head off to find and fix the problem.

soooo....there's this


bH90w