Haven't adjusted the valves yet. I've got your method archived....
re. manifold heat. The old Weiand manifold had exh heat under the carb and the old gaskets looked like the heat "burnt" the holes open. The new Edelbrock also has the cast in heat passage under the carb.
Instead of allowing it to just burn through I cut the 2 openings square to match the exh ports in the heads.
When I was researching the manifold swap I noticed some gaskets would come with metal block off plates to insert in the heads exh passages and the gasket was placed over them. Prevailing thought is manifold heat was good for street engines and not for race engines.
The manifold heating design is similar to the old ACVW's design it that the heat passage is tied to both head banks which provides a high/low pressure differential to flow the heated exh from one side through the passage to the other. Theres no valving just a pressure differential. I would notice one side (3/4) was so hot it couldn't be touched while the other side (1/2) wasn't as hot and could be touched. It worked on the ACVW's so perhaps the same or similar principle works on SBC's.
Will it be a problem flowing heat through an aluminum intake? I dunno. It was definitely designed for it.
