[lust4speed]

I might have missed it. Was the actual cam card posted?

Somewhere above I also read something about racers and cruisers, and not needing to be a racer. Actually, the suggested centerline by the cam company will provide the best efficiency, and as an added benefit, the most power. Any additional movement would be nothing more than a band-aid and probably reduce power and possibly raise temps. If you are wanting to band-aid the engine to reduce dynamic compression it would require a slight retard of the cam.

I've never seen an accurate timing chain setup where you could even start to trust the advance or retard keys. Most are ±1° up to almost 2° off.

Most of the heads I've had the machine shops clean up usually didn't exceed a .006" cut. The 10.75 ratio quoted by Pontiac was always closer to about 10.25:1 to start with, and that is still too much for today's premium pump gas.

As far as FelPro, they specify a crushed thickness of .039" and the used gaskets I've removed were right at that.

A great cooling system will remove heat from minor to mild build mistakes, a marginal cooling system won't remove heat from a properly running engine. Where does your system fall?