I had the same question, with an aluminum head big block, front and rear motor plate, giant engine setback, tall and wide fabbed aluminum valve covers, and a firewall less than 1/4" away from the back of the heads. Solution was to borrow a friends old cast iron intake,add a Summit carb pad lift plate with three hoop choices atop,tape off intake ports, use an old set or cheap set of gaskets, and temporarily bolt on to the motor. No chains or brackets to mess up valve covers or any aluminum bolt holesor surfaces. Also had no firewall/chain clearance either. Didn't want to wreck a heavily ported aluminum intake either. It worked absolutely great. It spread the load out evenly and securely on the intake manifold surface of the aluminum heads. Bill