Well I finally found a decent early TRX350 A model. Original one owner, it has been rolled but looks 99% complete. Owner says it won’t run and has no compression.
So i followed the sage advice provided in this forum and the repair manual–found one of the intake valves has a noticeable gap with the rocker arm. Looks like a head removal is now needed; debating now how much of the repair i want to do!