Matt, thanks for the reply and information! One further issue is that my old starter is the type without the side terminal. It only has the top terminal. I am planning to upgrade the ignition to one of the ignitor electronic setups. I don't want to put a ballast resistor onto the truck and upgrading to the electronic ignition seemed like the simplest way to avoid the resistor and hopefully get a better spark, too.
So, after all of that, I'm wondering if ditching the stomp starter and going with a solenoid based starter is really the best way to go? The replacement engine (from the 1960 Impala) has a working solenoid based starter on it. That engine was mated to a cast iron powerglide so it has a flex plate, not a flywheel. That would have to be replaced or I could replace the ring gear on the flywheel that's in the truck now to get the right number of gear teeth and put that onto the 1960 235.
OBTW, when I run the 1960 235 on the test stand, I do not run a ballast resistor. I don't remember for sure, but I think that when I got the engine from the junkyard I replaced the coil with an internally resisted coil. I did replace the coil, but not sure if it is internally resisted or not.... Starts and runs just fine, but its not the same load as driving it.
I guess at this point I'm open to suggestions.
