It does indeed sound like you borked the timing and slammed a valve. Were you sure to set tdc on cyl1

 

I thought I had it but did not do anything to confirm it besides the timing marks. Now I am also wondering if I spun the lower drivers side cam the wrong way. It was definitely the drivers side. Bummer.
So how bad would this be if the valve slammed? Is it just pulling the head and replacing one valve or could I have destroyed the head/block? And would it normally leak oil after bending the valve?
Thank you for the info. I am reading other threads too but sometimes it is hard to find what I did specifically.

 

Man I was thinking it was a fun job and glad I would be able to do it in the future. Lol. Oops. It’s only money I guess. Dang

 

We all make mistakes. I've been lucky enough not to mess up an engine but I've turned parts worth tens of thousands of dollars into boat anchors at work. briansmobile1 is pretty good but I'm not too familiar with the video relating to this. He does have a fair amount of knowledge on how to work with Subaru engines though.

At this point you can attack this a few ways. You can diagnose the exact problem and rebuild or source another jdm longblock. Depending on the depth of your wallet you can go from there. If everything is already in place for the jdm swap it may be the smartest financial move to find a longblock.

 

Update. I found a turbo crush washer and the drivers side avcs crush washer were not seated so that was the oil leaks. Crazy there were two and at the same time as the timing being off. I replaced the crush washers and am going to see if I shut it down early enough to save the valves.
So I rotated the lower cam sprocket counterclockwise to line up the marks again since that is the only thing I can think of. Any other way to verify the marks are correct? Should the valve be open or closed looking in the intake manifold holes, or any other trick before I try to restart? I have all the marks lined up again and putting the motor back in.

 

I blew it up. I got it in and it started and sounded fine. Idled great. I was like sweet, I fixed the timing just rotating it backwards. Warmed it up and decided to rev it a little before the test drive and bang clink clink. I was like what the heck was that? Did I leave a wrench that something hit.

I had shut it off right away and looked under and found a little piece of metal under the drivers side head. Oops. It blew the valve cove at the sparks plug. Bam. Ha ha.

oh well I was happy for a little while. I am doing college through the va so the new jdm on the way only cost a month and a half of my school money. Some might think a $1200 mistake is a big deal but for me it isjust another day on the farm. Lol

 

Thats a bummer. Not as bad as some but not as bad as it can be. 1200 isn't too bad.

I once did this by misplacing one tiny little decimal point on a blueprint...

Yep, I've been that guy.

 

I have my fingers crossed that you didn't pay for it with student loan money.

 

anybody want to buy a 2004 wrx with a blown engine?

 

Another update. When taking the timing belt off I found the tensioner pulley was bad. It is just stuck in the up position. I thought I checked it. So I guess I know why it jumped 6 teeth.
I got the new jdm in and I haven’t pulled the heads to see the damage in the old one yet. I just went to reuse everything and found that pulley was bad. Hopefully I can reuse some of the motor.
Anyone know the possible damage I will find when I pull off that drivers side head? I know the valve cover has a hole in it next to the from spark plug on the lowers cam area.

 

Another update. When taking the timing belt off I found the tensioner pulley was bad. It is just stuck in the up position. I thought I checked it. So I guess I know why it jumped 6 teeth.
I got the new jdm in and I haven’t pulled the heads to see the damage in the old one yet. I just went to reuse everything and found that pulley was bad. Hopefully I can reuse some of the motor.
Anyone know the possible damage I will find when I pull off that drivers side head? I know the valve cover has a hole in it next to the from spark plug on the lowers cam area.

If you blew a hole in the cover likely demolished the head. Cracked, warped and the piston is surely done.