WildBill

I was thinking fender vents like a mid-late 70s trans am had, would get rid of underhood heat and pressure.

That thing is looking sick! Flows with the lines of the car much better, excellent work!

On my Dodge truck w/Cummins diesel, the valves are adjusted cold. I suppose you could adjust the valves when hot, then check clearances when cold and use that spec. for cold adjustment, then do a quick run through when hot to double check (at least the first time). Seems like OHC with screw adjusters have hot adjust spec, OHC with shim/bucket are cold spec, and OHV engines with solid lifters have a cold adjust spec.

I asked them about R200 diff, they didn't bring any to the show but they said they have one available, didn't ask about spline count though!?

Your cylinder head? LOL, .004 sounds like it should be surfaced to me, but not sure what the specs are.

A TPI 350 is no slouch, heck, a 305 TPI would go pretty good in an IROC Z with damn near stock setup - shift into OD at about 120 if I remember correctly. And a Z car is much lighter, or course!

If you are going to run nitrous or turbo, I would use forged pistons for long-term durability.

you cut the line going to the rear brakes and add the lock inline

Holy crap, dude! I'd say about 20 grand or so should do it, or half that if you work for cheap!

Crane cam, call Crane and ask them if they can i.d. it.

This'll be cool, I'm finally making it down to SEMA this year, woohoo!!!

Yeah, I think people put overstate drivetrain losses a bunch. Factory power ratings are fudged this way and that so don't mean a whole lot. Even wheel dynos don't tell the whole story - i.e. air resistance while driving down the road. Synthetic fluids reduce drivetrain friction losses as stated above. The main thing, is that smaller, lighter components typically use less power than larger, heavier components. But at the potential cost of reliability due to strength. For example, my El Camino has a turbo 400 transmission and 12 bolt rear end. If I ran a turbo 350 and a 10 bolt, I could put more power to the ground because the smaller, lighter parts sap less power. But the odds of the staying together behind a 502 with nitrous is not as good. As for how much power each component saps, it's going to be different with different units (four or five speed, size ring gear, etc.), fluid type and weight, temperature, etc. Hell, tires have different rolling resistance, as well as different road surfaces! Try not to lose any more sleep over all this!

To me putting it on a 4x4 chassis is LESS of a deal than swapping in an American V8! Especially if it's on a Datsun chassis!

Sounds like float level is too high. Was it leaking on primary or secondary throttle shaft? (you really should go ahead & check/adjust both floats anyway). Never heard of longer bolts!? Are you talking the accelerator pump discharge nozzle?

Oww, hope you're doing ok, usually takes a day or two to really hurt, but at least you can man up about the whole thing, just keep moving forward!