Franked, for what it's worth, I would hate to see you end up unhappy with your build, but these are just educated opinions, experiences and keyboard warrior stuff on the forum - maybe we are right, maybe we are wrong.
First question I would wonder about is the badass stuff he builds Pontiac? If so, that is a good start, but not essential - but if not, they really must listen to you about the nuances of building a pontiac engine.
Then, if he has built a number of successful Pontiacs has he built a number of aluminum headed Ponchos? Ultimately, what is his specialty? Not everybody is a "jack of all trades" "I can build anything and have it run well" builder like Smoky Yunick was (and others like him).
I would still highly recommend that you talk to Kauffman directly about the compression tolerance of their d port heads, and their thoughts on the proposed combination.
They have built record winning engines. They have hundreds of hours of dyno time with those specific heads and a variety of builds. I guarantee that no other builder has done that with Kauffman D port heads.
After talking with Kauffman, then I would suggest you sit down and have a discussion with your engine builder.
If you feel that you have to walk on eggshells to avoid pissing off your builder and your builder is a "my way or the highway kind of guy" and doesn't want to listen to your inquiries and suggestions and is stuck on low compression (and anything under 10.5:1 would be considered low) with aluminum heads, I would suggest that you may want to seek another engine builder. If a builder behaves that way, that level of arrogance is not a sign of confidence, it is the sign of bully focused on taking your hard earned money and not really caring what product they deliver to the customer.
You are spending a lot of money on the engine build to have the combination end up not working well.
I look at engine builders in kind of the same way I look at physicians/surgeons (and I used to work with a lot of those, as well as engine builders - the art of medicine is somewhat similar to the art of mechanical "stuff" and engine building - just the body is a very complex biological machine). I come to them (both) as knowledgeable about what I want to accomplish as reasonably possible, so that I know and what I want to do is likely to work out well.
I observe if they are listening to me, and then listen to their suggestions. If they are arrogant, and don't at listen to what I am trying to discuss, and do not calmly and rationally lay out their approach and why it is better than what I was thinking I wanted to do, then I will respectfully thank them for their time and find another option. Good luck with your build! I look forward to hearing about a successful project.
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