Give me your opinion on this engine combination....

[35chevy]

Thanks to all of you who helped me out on my 408 combination. I have all the parts I need to assemble the shortblock but I'm not ready to shell out the funds for the camshaft and valvetrain components at this time. So, I think I'll repair the 350 that's in the car now while I'm saving up some money so I can ride until the 408 is done. The story on the 350 is some idiot(me) was detailing the engine getting ready for a car show, and got a little too happy with the water hose. One of the connecting rods got all bent up about it. It has been in the car for around 12 years but I've only put a little under 10,000 miles on it. The inside is spotless and there is almost no wear on the cylinders or the bearings. All it needs is one rod and piston so it won't be that expensive to fix it. When the 408 is done I can save this engine for a truck I'm building. It's a 4 bolt bored .020, balanced, speed pro h631p pistons(flat top 2 valve relief), 64cc camel hump heads, Comp xe268 cam, 1.5 rockers, Perf. RPM intake and a 600 carb. and 1 5/8 shorty headers. I've never been happy with this engine. I've always had detonation problems even with 93 octane in the hot summer and it seems like this pile of parts should make more power. It's a dog. I degreed the cam when I built it (106 I believe) and I rechecked it a while back and It's right. When I removed the head to pull the bent rod I did a little measuring and found the pistons are .028-.029 down in the hole. I've got a .039 head gasket so that gives me .068 quench. I'm thinking about getting some .015 head gaskets to get the quench around .044 and using my 72cc sportsman II heads on it which I believe would drop the dynamic compression to around 8:1. Give me your thoughts on this combination. Maybe some of you can dyno sim this for me and see if a change in cam timing or rocker ratio might be of benifit. Thanks for your help guys....oh yeah here's a bigger shot of the car. The bottom of the hood is painted now