[71Firebird]

Hey Guys,
My son's 76 Firebird STR8 6 blew and the head cracked. We're trying to do this ourselves, we have a hoist and engine stand, and are taking the old out. We bought an 81 inline 6, but after it was dropped off and we are looking at it closer we see it's not designed the same. This one has alot of tubing coming out of the valve cover, and it has a Rodchester Varijet II on it rather than a Monojet....it also has two exhuasts, one next to the other, not the single the orig engine had.

The linkage for the carb is all different as will be the exhaust...everything else looks like it'll fit in fine. The intake and exhaust heads are different, seperate, but totally different design than the regular head that was original. So we can't use the intake, exhaust, or carb off the orig.

Here's our questions, we're at a complete stop now and need some advice...

1. Is this 81 Chevy/GMC 6 better than the reg 250 that was in there?...being the carb is a little bigger, two exhaust, etc)
2. Should we go with this or look for an early 70-76 inline 6?....if we do, is there a linkage adapter we can use to change the linkage?
3. There is a bunch of tubing (smog?) stuff on the valve cover (it's a 5 bolt, as opposed to the orig 3 bolt on side away from carb), can this stuff just be pulled off?

We sure would appreciate any help anyone can give us as we're kinda stumped at this point....don't know whether to try and put this 81 in and figure out how to get the linkage and exhaust to work...or should we look longer for a 71-76 and try and sell the 81?
Thanks!