I remember seeing write ups on these kits BEFORE Chryslers anouncements of the re-release of the 426. At that time the anything original Hemi was through the roof. Blocks especially were hard to come by. I saw blocks go in the $5K and way up range that were totally trashed (Picture a block with a hole in the side or chewed up bottom end) simply because there were no replacements available.

At the time the only reasonable looking alternatives seemed to be what Indy and stage V were doing and it looked pretty promising at the time. I suspect both companies had invested a LOT of money in R&D and initial low production runs.

AND THEN........Mopar made it's anouncements about the re-release of the 426 with big inch versions to follow closely behind.

As the Hemi conversions I'd read about at the time did not seem to show any real preformance advantage over the Chrysler Hemi and as you mentioned not that much difference in price, the conversions have pretty much faded into the woodwork.

I did see one of these conversions heads years ago, The owner had just bought them prior to Mopars anouncement. My understanding was after the anouncement he was not very happy and wished he had waited.

Had Chrysler decided NOT to bring the second generation Hemi back, and Indy/Stage V had enough demand, these conversions may have gone come down in price due to doing higher volume production runs, but we'll never know.