Holeshot___again..thank you for the thoughts. Clearly you know what your talking about with AMC's. That's what I need. I'm impressed that you even have one of those rare tunnel rams never mind run it on the street! As far as my situation goes, I have a unique situation...I don't want to make too much power. I want to put together a fast cruiser. By that I mean geared up (probably 3.15s...maybe 3.54s) running a t-85 3spd with a borg warner (.7) overdrive through a moderately beefed up car. There is not much that can be done to my understanding to strengthen up the t-85 and overdrive much beyond stock(everything will be rebuilt), so that is my "power limitation"...I don't want to tear it up. That is why no slicks, no drag radials, (I would grudgingly consider leaving out my sure grip if need be) I would rather spin the tires before I can load up the driveline with evough torque to bust anything, hopefully. I am trying to put together a motor that very much favors low to mid range power as I intend to keep the cruise speed down to 2000 or below. I'm looking at putting in a cam with short duration and high(for a short duration) lift... 0.50 or so. I know what your thinking...for the time and effort(and expense) a much faster motor(and car) could easily be built. True, but I want a cruiser(around town and highway) this time. I have a 69 Firebird with a 12.5:1 comp 383, race ported 461 heads, crane gold rockers, stud girdle, big solid lift cam, Team G intake with a modified 750 double pumper, and a 8 3/4 mopar rear with both 3.91 posi and 4.56 and spool on a seperate carrier. That's plenty for me! I want the opposite this time. A 13.5 quarter would be just fine on street tires for this car. Faster would be great, but no big deal.
I was looking at going bigger (in stroke) just for the reason that you mentioned. Drop the rpm range down...and gain a bit of "free torque" in the process with a few more cubes. I'm only looking at say 5500rpm or so max here. Boring..I know! The head porting that I mentioned was to open up the chambers to allow the KB pistons that I want to run to be able to drop to the 10.2:1 or so range. The runner and bowl work would be towards low lift flow to get the most out of the short duration. Blending the backs of the valves, etc. The dual quad idea is more of a style thing that admittedly my girlfriend favors more than I do. They would go well with my vintage aluminum edelbrock valve covers. Personally, I'm very tempted to make it as stock looking as I can get away with(gold 66 290 colors and all) throw a correct air cleaner on with the typhoom 290 4v sticker on it along with a set of 290 badges ot the rear quarter panels, and not let anyone in on what's really in there. I will be running an air conditioning compressor along with a power steering pump on this motor, so that may end up looking more appropriate anyway. I am trying to hold myself back here in the all out speed department, but I admit I consider "improvement potential" when I am trying to put parts together. I have a real nice set of 291 heads if I wanted to jump into the higher compression bracket, etc, etc
I'd love to hear more of your thoughts,

George