sometimes I wonder....

The slanty was a clean slate for the engineers in the late 50's, and the V-8's
were not as far as the 1st gen. hemi and A(poly) were concerned. The "new"B-RB"
eng. was, but was never intended to cross paths w/an A-body.Therefore everything
developed for the '60 release was engineered around packaging and the service/
application requirements.The 7 1/4 rear has been an exceptionally reliable rear in
everything it was supposed to be in, and cost less to produce/sell than the 8 3/4
by far, which was the only alternative 'till the 8 1/4 came around much later.
People bought 6cyl. A's for economy,in purchase,service, and operation. It
seems silly to us today not to have ponied up the extra $70 or so for the new LA
273 eng. option when it came out in '64,but that is how it was, and often.Why pay
for something you don't need? The LA was a lightweight update of the poly A, and
those bellhousings just don't jive,remember the slants had small flywheels and a
very convenient to change starter position, Mopar didn't give two ***** about some
gearhead 40-50 yrs. later wanting to stuff a stroker 360 w/full length headers in
'em. By the way, the 7 1/4 in my '87 V-6 Dak is still going strong at 145K, and
it's hauled more than it should've, too many times!!! :)