Toyota is your best bet to offer all genuine items as a complete short block motor, although be prepared to pay a premium! I doubt anyone on here will be able to find a brand new block. Best bet is to find a stock motor with tight bores then you can squeeze in the stock pistons.
Never heard of that before with a seal lol. Just because a headgasket is new doesn't maen it should leak gas ;) Take it back mate and say your not happy with the service.
How many cylinder heads you got to practice on and how bigs your wallet? lol. 60 bottom cut, 45 valve seat cut and a 30 top cut is a general idea. To get the exact angle will need a lot of time, patients and money.
The reason I went with Pauter was because I didn't want to notch the block, touching the material at all could induce stress fractures/cracks. Yes you can sonic test for these, but you won't ever find a problem until you are running serious pressures in the combustion chamber.
Thought they were £399 over here? Might of seen that price on TD website. They do the job but wouldn't be my choice of rod which is why i've gone with Pauter.
Read a bad review on the mazda 3mps about them overfuelling as standard and you get carbon deposits behind the intake valves, when the deposits fall off they can detonate on the chamber and causes some serious damage! My mate also has one and they aren't a very good chassis, torque steer like crazy, probably won't be so bad with an lsd though.