I plan to do a compression check as soon as I get it to crank over. I really appreciate the offer but I will buy a compression tester this week since I really should own one anyways.
Btw I asked my girl to describe better what she saw from behind before it died and she "sparks" I said sparks like a sparkler on 4th of July or bursts of flames. She said " oh yeah like that..flames not sparks" . That makes more sense.