First of all, let me just say you've made a shitload of progress. The fact that you're a broke-ass high school student makes what you've done so far even more impressive. Don't discount the road you've been down as a curse so much as a comedy of errors. You are being forged in the fires of automotive paradox. When you emerge on the other side, your gearhead skills will be hardened steel.

The car looks great. Forget about the mouth-breathing cock holster who tried to scam you on it. That shit is poison and it will eat you from the inside out. He hamfisted that shit back together to the best of his crack-baby abilities and probably blew all the money you paid for it on fake portal vents and a piece of shit that will leave his sorry ass stranded on the side of the road some night. Karma always comes correct, and the longer it takes, the sweeter it is. Look how much better that car is because you owned it.

Be extra careful with the re-assembly. I'm not saying the Felpro gasket failure was your fault - shit happens, right? But I have used pretty much nothing but Felpro stuff on all my cars and have never had a problem with it. Short of serious investigation by qualified engineer-types, we may never know. Just be extra vigilant when it all goes back together. After all, which is more important - proving who was wrong, or making sure it's done right?

You're not alone. Way back in the day, I completed my first engine build in a friend's mom's backyard. A couple months later, I installed a $2000 race head. A month after that, a wrist pin lock failed, resulting in a $400 set of forged Wiseco ash trays.

I ordered a set of Venolia pistons from ERT.

SEVEN MONTHS LATER I got my pistons. We rebuilt the engine.

THREE DAYS LATER, the clutch bolts backed out (didn't chase the threads before install, slight surface rust from being exposed for seven fucking months in a friend's mom's backyard). The flexplate turned into a circular saw one night (yep - always at night) at about 7000rpm as I was breaking in the new bottom end. Sliced a hole in the transmission, puked out all the fluid. Left me stranded.

It took us a week to get the thing apart and get a buddy capable of welding cast aluminum to seal it up. I was back on the road.

THREE DAYS LATER, the input shaft bearing scattered inside the transmission, leaving me stranded again.

I went the better part of a YEAR on a single tank of gas. Daisy was my daily driver at the time, too. And I still get shit for parking my car in run4cvr's mom's backyard. (The irony is, in a week or so, I'll be helping him move HIS non-running 2GNT into the same parking place.)

The more fucked up the story is, the more useful it will be to you down the road. It fucking suuuuuuuuucks today, but tomorrow you will laugh.

Hell, one year we all chipped in and bought DarkOne three hours of dyno time for his birthday. He blew his engine on the first or second pull. No one is immune to the suck. Embrace it. Laugh at it. Cowboys from motherfucking hell.

Hope this helps.