Intermission...
I just wanted to make a comment as a new Fiat X19 owner myself. About a month ago I was driving along, happy as a pig in poop. As I remember I had a small blip in the clutch, but no audible noise as you had experienced and then the result was a fast turning over sound when I tried to restart the car, indicating there was no compression. That is a good compression test as it is, turning over the engine, and finding it is whirring around like there is no tomorrow means you have no compression in my mind.
Although my issues were more obvious than yours, my timing belt was stripped.
The best thing I did at that point was to take the cam cover off and invited Doug over on the weekend. We measured the gap and found some valves were about normal and others you could drive a freight train through them.
I also had trouble finding the timing marks. I found the crank mark burried under a layer of rust and dust, with a good small flashlight and a mirror. I quickly borrowed my wifes white nailpolish and then proceeded to lose it in the shuffle. (This was the most expensive part of the diagnostic). Doug helped me find the cam timing mark which was located on the opposite side. When you stand on the drivers side and look at the cam pulley from the back side, you will see a pointer, an upside down triangle that is part of the mounting bracket for the yellow cover. Then we bumped the car forward in gear, until the small mark lined up with the inverted triangle.
I, Similar to you, was disheartened. I had just ordered complete rear brakes and a master cylinder for the car and thought I had all the "half-truths" when buying a used car, in hand. My wife in her ultimate wisdom said to me, "how could you lose my nailpolish you a-hole!" No she did not, LOL that was just a joke. She said, "well you GOT the car so you could work on it, and now you have something to work on!"
She was right! So I got busy with the spanners (wheeler dealer) and on sunday removed the carb, intake manifold and cam box, all the fasteners went in one container for that. On monday (it was a long weekend) I removed the cylinder head and found my bent exhaust valves and one valve completely broken. Back in December I bought myself a socket set. I waited until they went on sale and got a complete SAE and Metric set from 4mm to 22mm that included the spark plug sockets, I bought a large hex set for the oil drain plug, and a big 26mm with a long bar and a good multi-meter, and a set of feeler guages, oh and a vacuum guage all for under $200. I think you can do most things on this car with that. A few weeks ago I got fancy and bought a Vernier caliper and a vacuum pump to bleed brakes for $50.
I took my carb to get it rebuilt because it was off anyways, this will be 2-250 by the time it is done. I got a complete set of valves, gasket set and the screws to close off the air ports on the side of the cylinder head for $150 shipped to Canada.
Now the issue I have is to remove two broken studs for the exhaust manifold, which you should not have this problem as the engine was rebuilt 2 years ago and should have new studs. I was waiting for a friend to remove them but he may be too busy, I am blessed that I have a good machinist in the family to help me clean this up next week so I can take the cylinder head to an automotive machinist to do his magic. I am estimating $500 for that.
Once I get the head back I will bolt it all back together.
In the meantime, I have taken the distributor apart, found a floating washer in the bowl, and unmatching springs on the advance, so I cleaned all that up and removed a layer of dirt and oil out of the engine compartment and feel that I know much more about what is going on with this car than I did before. And that is a good feeling and a sense of security to understand this car and how it works and to make sure it is working properly. And to boot, the net effect was not that expensive. In fact, I think I took the most expensive route to get there and I am happy to do it, because I am learning something. So do not be disheartened by it all, it really is not complicated. It is all easy to do if you have a feel for it and know which way to turn a wrench!
Cheers,
M