Cool collection of e-bodies / latest on my 340 build

[64dartgt]

So I found a new shop to do my 340 engine.  To recap, the 318 in my Charger developed a bearing knock.  I bought a 71 "rebuilt" 340 which has lots of new parts but got a garage honing and needs to go from 0.030 to 0.060 to clean up the pitted bores.  It sat at a machine shop for five months waiting for the guy, who has a great reputation, to go through it.  He did so, but then quoted me $5500 to rebuild it...which latter dropped to $4000 if I provided the parts. 

The new shop is http://www.bmotorworks.com/ and the owner is a certified Mopar nut.  He has photos of some of his toys on his site and he has a few more.  The guy has corned the market on Cuda's.  He has a convertible, a Hemi, an AAR and a 440 6-pack (project)...but he has not time to drive them.  I told him I'd be happy to help him out 

He said the crank looks good, so hopefully we are just looking at boring the block 0.060, polishing the crank and decking the heads a little, which has rust on the mating surface.  If I was a betting man I bet he will have to shave the intake too.  The block has been decked already.

I am a bit concerned about compression, as the 71 was 10.4 to 1 from the factory and with the decking of the block and heads, which are 589 castings which have a similar volume to the stock heads from what I have been able to look up (~72cc's).  I want to use pump gas.  Can I use a thicker head gasket to keep the compression down?  Anyone have any experience with this?