alum edelbrock heads

^^ But if he gets RPM's with 63 cc combustion chambers (or even 65 cc's) and bolts them on in place of stock open heads, will he not see a good bump up in CR? In my experience, that is not going to be 'no increase in performance'.... should be a low/mid range torque boost, and the better flow OOTB may help the upper end a bit. But it would likely require some tuning for timing and perhaps secondary jet changes??

But, I do agree that doing this with a complete long-term plan in mind is certainly the best. Wedon't really know a thing about the OP's present engine to really be able to say; he has not shared that info, and would be wise to do so, IMO.

Not sure I understand this question: "Do you have to run a special head gasket or are the ports the same as stock? "

If the RPM heads that the PO has are complete with valves/springs/retainers, then that seems to be a good deal. But the springs are a question to me to see if they will work the stock valvetrain; find out which springs are in there; it looks like they are different for a stock type flat tappet cam versus a roller tappet cam in the same RPM head. The info in post #7 deserves some close attention in regards to the strength of the stock rockers versus the springs. If you don't need absolute max RPM's at this point, then some lighter springs ought to help that.

And make sure the heads are for the rocker shaft type heads; these are also made for Magnum style rockers.