Address the quench first. There is no magic #. Tighter is better. .035' - .040" is safer. Address the detonation with fuel, ignition timing, cam timing, water.



So my first assumption is the purpose of quench is to keep the mixture uniform in temp and maintain fuel/air mixture, and possibly cool relative hot spots in the chamber. And I freely admit we are not speaking F1/Nasacar here, but to move the amount of air that quench does, in 8 cyls, at 7K?, I bet it takes/absorbs a reasonable amount of horsepower to move all that air from a dead stop, really fast. But if it allows greater hp to be made, that offsets and exceeds the pumping losses, we then chase quench. Forgetting mechanical issues of quench, regarding rod stretch, growth, etc, it would seem there should be a magic quench goal for each engine combination. What that is, I have no clue.071

Reality check, that half the population is smarter then 50% of the people and it's a constantly contested fact.