I'm putting a stroker small block in a '69 Valiant, 360 block with a 4" crank, RHS heads, solid flat tappet cam, 10-1 compression, should make around 475hp, using a A500 trans, with its low first gear and a 3.73 rear set should be fun all around. The car will probably weigh 3300 I'm guessing?, manual steering and brakes, bench seat, 8.75 rear, Calvert bars and springs Pro Star wheels. Having the torque that the crank provides, light car, and easy to work on engine bay, (changing plugs etc), better handling than a BB due to weight on the nose, should be a fun car, maybe mid-11's and really driveable with the overdrive.
^^^ I'm a big block guy but if you're starting from scratch I vote on this ^^^
I've had a couple 9 second Mopars and my current Duster would easily run 10's but I built it from scratch just to cruise, it's a 400 low deck stroked to 500 inches, the car is a total blast and everything I wanted but I'm dying to have an overdrive transmission some how!! The small block stroker will make power and will be much easier to work on as everyone has already pointed out. There are no wrong answers in this thread, lots of good ideas, but my honest opinion is that CHEAP and BOOST do not belong in the same sentence. And the little 340 and 360 motors are nowhere near as fun for the most part as a big block or a stroked small block, been there done that, they usually require more to run 11's than what some of these guys are saying(although I do believe that they did it, I've seen it done and did it my self with 346 cubic inches), then the streetability starts to fade.
I was planning a small block for my Duster but ran across a great deal on a new forged stroker kit that a guy had laying around, a local well known guy built my short block very cheap and bingo, 500 cubic inches. I went this route for torque so that I could run a fairly tight converter for street duty, 3.23 or 3.55 gears, pump gas 10:1 compression, small 557 lift solid cam, and I found a guy selling B-body headers that were already massaged to fit a low deck A-body, got those for $75 and used an AR-Engineering motor plate so I could cut the motor mount stands off my k-member and have room for the headers and oil pump etc.
I then found a deal on racingjunk.com on a set of CNC max wedge Eddy heads and Indy intake.
This car would easily run 10's and it could be used as a daily driver, it is a total blast and I have plenty of areas to improve on if I ever want to go faster.
