OK guys, here it comes:

I'm planning (= banchracing:) ) on buying a 454.
Since some time I'm leaning more and more to the OLD SCHOOL looks / performance. To keep the look, together with optimizing the performance, here are the rules I set for myself:

1. Stock bottom end (no stroking in the beginning to keep the costs down)
2. The only changes allowed are: cam + lifters, intake, carb, porting the heads, roller rockers

Here are my questions:
1. What type/year has got good potentials - heads / compression (no exotic LS6 etc please ;) )
2. What are possible donor cars for this engine?
3. What power potentials to expect?

So to summarize: I'm looking for cheap torque with old school looks

Thanks for any input

1)Any 'large oval port' head is great for the street. If/when you find a core look up the casting#s on www.mortec.com to find the port and chamber specs. Compression will be set up by the piston choice.
2) There were no "undesirable" 454s except tall decks found in big trucks/busses/industrial applications. Most common source here is light trucks.
3)450-500hp is easy with flat hyd cam and dual plane intake, and very streetable.

If you won't change the pistons you'll likely have a worn out 8.5:1
shortblock to work with.

The two part methodology seems to be:
Spend the $ and build a good shortblock and 'use what you have' for heads.
Save up and get some good heads (and another 100 hp) later.

2) There were no "undesirable" 454s except tall decks found in big trucks/busses/industrial applications. Most common source here is light trucks.

You mean like light truks will probably have a tall deck core?


3)450-500hp is easy with flat hyd cam and dual plane intake, and very streetable.

That's what I'm looking for + 100/150 shot of nitrous, which shouldn't be a problem for a BBC


If you won't change the pistons you'll likely have a worn out 8.5:1
shortblock to work with.

Thinking about milling the heads, maybe also the block


The two part methodology seems to be:
Spend the $ and build a good shortblock and 'use what you have' for heads.
Save up and get some good heads (and another 100 hp) later.

Or third option = stock block/heads with only the changes I've mentionned + some nitrous


Ofcourse also looking for some opinions on the cam/intake/carb combo to max out the performance (within the possible CR, without changing the bottom end)

No truck block means Medium Duty truck, like c-60 and such. I unless it has been newly rebuilt I wouldn't use a stock worn out short block no matter the compression.