Not saying I'm going to build one cause I have a 355 with dart heads and a 383 with trickflows that aren't being used for anything but I traded a holley carb for a set of oval port 781 heads. Very clean and recently tanked with valve job, no valves/springs/retainers.

Worth scrapping the 355 and or 383 to chase a 454/468/496? Any reliable companies I can send these to and get whatever work done to them that I need? I would want to do a serious track/mild street (QQ/Historic plates) big block.

 

It doesn't take much to work over some 781 castings. A good port and polish job and having some 2.19/1.88 valves installed really wakes them up. Although they'll work fine for most usage, don't expect high rpm shift points on a 496. Getting into a big engine will need bigger heads to flow enough air at high rpm. Although the oval ports are good, even with porting, they still don't flow as much as some rectangular port heads.

781 and 049 heads are everywhere. They were probably on just about every pickup truck through the 70's that had a big block in it.

Before you send them anywhere, get price quotes on porting and valve replacement. Chances are buying a new set of Merlin iron heads http://www.worldcastings.com/product...ron-heads.html will be a better bang for the buck.

The 781 heads are fine if you want to do your own work to them but investing a lot of money into the heads isn't really worth it when you see how much is available in the aftermarket. Exotic BBC heads are a lot more affordable than they were 20-30 years ago.

 

Anytime he gives advise on BBC's it is 99% gospel dead on.The other 1% is a typo.LOL.