All bolts, seals etc will be new, of course. They're doing a valve job, too. On master tech's advice I'm reluctantly keeping the two vanos as there is nothing wrong with them...

There was nothing wrong with my vanos pre rebuild, has since developed a vanos start up rattle. Will be stripping it down again soon and resealing the vanos and replacing the crank shaft seal as the new 1 is leaking.

That's my concern but as nothing's wrong and a possible vanos failure cannot be catastrophic, I guess I'll be taking a calculated risk and save 2,5K for now...

Pending receipt of some parts, reassembly will begin next week. Chain guides, the lower "V" in particular were on their way out. Not totally shot but well worn.
What they forgot to mention last time and was brought up by today's discussion, well, it turns out that the whole HG issue was caused by loose head bolts! Like fingertight loose! Not just one of them but many, if not most (or all?) They hardly used any force on the ratchet undoing them
Mechanic said this could either be due to some overheating or, more likely, due to human error. That there could have been a previous HG job and bolts were never torqued to spec...Heads are not warped or cracked and have now been resurfaced just fine. Block is in perfect shape and true.
All the odds so far seem to stack in favor of a good fix...

Good news

Vanos seals repair kit is available from beisan systems if you want to consider that option while doing everything else .
A special tool is also required to crimp seal the vanos after seal replacement .
Full instructions on their website . Very low cost repair and should last a lot longer than original factory seals .

Thanks for this, I am aware of the beisan systems Vanos repair kit & procedure. Apparently the garage cannot or will not undertake such operation. For the time being I'll leave them alone as there's nothing wrong with them and take my time to shop around for a reasonably priced set and keep it in the spares box...

This week's snowfall has stalled progress of just about everything and the Rover's repair could not have been unaffected. Good thing the spares are all there now and reassembly can begin. I do have an extra laundry list of minor stuff that I want done which I hope they won't drag on any longer than the main job

At (long) last, engine is ready! Sorting out a few extra things I requested and the fat girl will be parked on my driveway by Friday afternoon...Already looking forward to a great weekend

After 52 days...She's back! Drove a few km from the garage to work this morning and everything feels great. Wonderful start of a sunny day