Good work Joe, you have confirmed the water ingestion for sure….
OK, now to try to pinpoint the actual leak….Do you have a little inspection light you can peek inside the lower cylinder with? With the engine off and plugs out, turn on the water gently while peeking inside the cylinder with the light, perhaps you can see exactly where/how the water is getting into the lower cylinder. Many possibilities here. Perhaps the owner will get lucky and you will find that just the cylinder head is gouged/porous. Or, maybe water is leaking by the SS exhaust/water baffle somehow…
I remember a case where a V4 block was actually porous right near one of the exhaust ports, and the water was dribbling back into the cylinder. This fellow wasn’t so lucky…
Once you have pinpointed the leak area, go ahead and restart the engine with no water going through it, to expel the water that got sprayed inside…
It sounds like you have already found another powerhead for this engine, hopefully you won’t need to replace the powerhead….Let me know if I can help with any other parts…D
Your compression report would indicate that water is getting by the head gasket somehow, unless the rings have gotten stuck after getting wet all the time….
