It's in, buttoned up & runs great!
I love the character the XFi cam gives the engine. 5th gear is usable for cruising at around-town speeds now, where the engine wouldn't have been happy doing it before.
One thing I didin't recall from the first time I did this swap:
The engine did NOT want to start afterward. The first 3 times I turned the key, it spun really fast, almost as though there was no compression.
The 4th time it caught, but ran
really rough -- was sure I must have jumped a cog on the crank gear when I was messing with the timing belt.
The 5th time, it ran less rough, then smoothed out after about 30 seconds.
I wonder if the lifters were messed up from being depressurized?
Maybe the fast spinning at first wasn't a
lack of compression (obviously), but with if no valves were opening at first, the cylinders were just being air springs?