Hi, my mates Headgasket has gone after only owning it 2 weeks, he's wanting to know everything which is required?

Specialist tools?

Stretch bolts?

Book time to do it all?

Get head skimmed while its off?

Anything else to do while heads off?

Thanks!

Assuming head is warped it will need skimming yes. You'll need the head bolts as they are one use.

I heard stories about skimmed heads losing 20bhp due to change in compression when skimmed. Not sure how real that is. I have a spare VGC unskimmed head if he wants to build up a donor head to save time. Comes with valves, VGC tappets.

With the cylinder head being ally I'd get it skimmed regardless, ally head's easily warp out of shape from the slightish hint of over heating. I know with certain head's depending on how much is taken off them, you can get a thicker steel gasket to accommodate the thickness which was removed to help retain as near to standard compression ratio's as possible. Without my FAI book to hand (at home now) I can't check to see if this is the case for the vRS