Yes i could do a compression check at my shop. I haven't seen the landlord in a few days so haven't been able to shove cash in his face and take my engine, but he'll turn up. He's always out there working on something.
I thought about taking the motor out of my car now and building that, and putting the other block in my car and driving it - but then lets say the other engine runs like butt because it's been sitting for 20 years... but I know mine runs, and it runs ok. It slings out out the valve cover seams like oil is free - BUT I know exactly how to deal with this engine. Swapping another one in would be another mystery to solve.
I'm thinking cost prohibitively as well - that I should build the 80s block to just be robust, and keep my 60s engine around till i have buku bucks to rebuild that. I'd like to say I have money to play with these things like some of the people on here, but all I can do is get what I can get. I work as a carpenter, and have family, other car to pay for, etc... I'm not complaining, just being realistic - I can't afford to build something totally awesome.
BUT I can afford to rebuild a nice engine back to good and reliable, get a nice cam grind, double roller timing chain, oversized pistons (just because why not). I feel like the machine shop will charge me the same for boring .030 as .060, so why not 60? I know it doesn't make a huge difference, and my dad stated that then I wouldn't have any more rebuilds really if there was an issue, but I have a whole nother engine. If that's the only place I can pick up even .00001HP then why not do it? It looks like I'll pass on the 198 idea for this block then, since I did read up as well and found the bearings and everything are different for the different cranks. But that's ok, like I said - make a really good engine here, and strap a turbo to it, and I believe it will be better than the 47 year old engine in it right now that's never been rebuilt with mysterious overheating issues.
I built my current turbo setup with the motor in the car, and just think of how much nicer I can make it with the engine in a non-restricted environment? That's what I plan to do.
Then I can set the 60s engine aside, and build it later.
My plan is to build this new motor, then pull the old one on a friday, scrape the whole engine bay down, and get it ready for paint, move some wiring around, spray it Saturday (turbine bronze) and then put the engine in Sunday.
Also my color scheme may be a bit weird for the new motor, but I have seen a lot of red, blue, orange slants, and even saw a purple and green one after I tried that too. I am thinking of a White engine block and head, with copper valve cover, Black intake and exhaust, Copper oil pan, and some really really good sealing so that oil doesn't mess it up. No chrome. I know, I'm weird.