Thanks for all the thoughts. How cool is it to stay up late blueprinting and have this community to bounce questions off of- with a batch of well informed suggestions waiting to read by lunch the next day?!

I will check the fire ring on the 1009. I had a radical shovelhead harley with heads that were difficult to seal with blue felpros- cometic mls or straight soft copper was the answer but I have had good luck with .040 felpros on aluminum head smallblocks and steel shims on iron head rebuilds.

I never had a block shot peened before- this 400 block had about three gallons of hemi orange spraypaint on it so my machine shop said peening was the way to go to get it clean. The block is impressive looking like a new casting but the surface is definitely rough compared to a fresh cut deck- more like as cast type finish.

If the 1009 hangs over I will look into a cut and a thicker gasket to get me back to .040 but for a street motor the temptation to screw it together is pretty compelling. Of course I don’t want to leave power on the table or have nagging doubts about shortcuts but for the street I will probably have room to really let a 512 eat almost never so I don’t want to get bogged down if I can be driving.

Thanks fellas