350 short block help

[par4tom]

I apologize in advance for the length of this question:

I have a 61 chevy truck with an l48 350 2 bolt engine and 462 double hump heads. Compression is 10.25:1 and currently the motor does somewhere around 310 hp with an RV cam. It has been bored out twice over its lifetime and is about .060 over.

Edelbrock intake dual plane, msd ignition and Holley 670 Street Avenger carburetor.

The engine recently bent a pushrod and now I have a pretty bad compression problem on the #5 cylinder.

I pulled the heads and I'm going to go back through the motor which is the first time I've had to do this in almost 20 years.

Ok, so here is my objective and my parameters:

1. I m looking to make about 350 to 375 hp at the wheels using this basic set up. Not going to the strip with this truck, but want to have some fun between 0-70 mph with a lot of low end torque.

2. I do not want a temperamental motor due to tons of cam lift.

3. For aesthetics and a more genuine old school approach, I want to retain the 462 double hump heads. Currently the are the 1.94 and not the 2.02's and the block and heads were out of 67 Camaro SS.

4. The engine block is in good shape and does not need to be rebored. In fact, both the block and heads are in excellent shape.

So I go to my local speed shop with my situation, and he suggests doing a 383 stroker set up, rehoning the cylinders, porting and polishing the heads and grinding them for the 2.02 valves. These 462 heads came from the factory with both set ups as options. He also suggested dropping the compression down a bit to 9.5 to run better on pump gas.

I'm using the factory exhaust manifolds off a 66 corvette with the 2 1/2 center dump "rams horn" design. I don't plan to change these either as I just had them ceramic coated and I like more of that old school look.

What do you guys think? Anyone done one of these striker motors? How do you like it? What do you think about the 2.02 valves versus the 1.94's? Being that its a street driver and I m planning on putting on a lot of highway mileage, does it even matter?

BTW... The speed shop wants $2000 to do all the machine work including heads, block, crank valve train andvpistons. Includes assembly with roller rocker something or others (I d have to go to the taller valve covers).

Once again, I'm looking at a fun setup with lots of torque, don't need 500 hp. 400 would be great but not essential.

Does anyone have a better idea here? Or is this stroker motor a good option given my parameters.

Thanks,
Tom
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